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BAROQUE 


BY THE SAME AUTHOR 


Linda Lee, Inc. 

Joan Thursday 
Alias the Lone Wolf 
Red Masquerade 
The Dark Mirror 
The False Faces 
Sheep’s Clothing 
The Lone Wolf 
The Day of Days 
Nobody 

The Destroying Angel 
The Bandbox 
Cynthia-of-the-Minute 
The Fortune Hunter 
N o Man’s Land 
The Pool of Flame 
The Bronze Bell 
The Black Bag 
The Brass Bowl 
Terence O’Rourke 




BAROQUE 

A MYSTERY 


BY 

LOUIS JOSEPH .VANCE 

a 




NEW YORK 

E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY 
681 Fifth Avenue 










t 


BAROQUE 

By Louis Joseph Vance 
Copyright, 1923, by Louis Joseph Vance 

DOUBLE DOOM 
By Louis Joseph Vance 
Copyright, 1922-1923, by the McCall Company 


All rights reserved, including the rights of translation into foreign 
languages, including the Scandinavian. 


\ 


i 




A MS' 



AUTHOR’S NOTE 


Under the editorial title of Double Doom this story has 
appeared serially in McCall's Magazine . 


L. J. V. 


Darien, 1 January 1923. 




BAROQUE 


I 

T> ENEATH one of those skies of immaculate aquama¬ 
rine which New York winters boast a lilac dusk was 
shading into violet, golden windows were gayly blossom¬ 
ing in the austere facades of Murray Hill, motor-cars 
were unclosing yellow orbs to guide them through the 
heaped sierras of the season’s first considerable snowfall 
—and Rodney Manship was buckling into a bleak head¬ 
wind that, sweeping down Madison Avenue, stung his 
ears till they burned and his eyes till they wept. 

The mist that clouded them was, however, not so blind¬ 
ing as to prevent his discovering at length a legend in 
letters of gold upon the lightly frosted windows of a 
corner shop— 

BAROQUE BROS. 

—and with a grunt of relief he steered for the door and, 
to the cheery welcome of a bell that tinkled overhead, let 
himself into an atmosphere stuffy with steam heat and 
heady with strange scents, musk and myrrh and sandal¬ 
wood mingling with the indescribable smell of the dust 
that clings to old, used things. 

The shop that occupied all the ground floor of a re¬ 
modelled mansion was, even so, all too small for the 
heterogeneous accumulation of objects of virtue more or 
less problematic which huddled its floor, climbed its walls, 
and even in part depended by wires and chains from its 
ceiling: a riot of colour, a jumble of forms; pieces great 
and small of antique furniture, paintings, tapestries. 


2 


BAROQUE 


stands of armour Oriental as well as Occidental, churchly 
vestments and secular, squat heathen idols, vases of every 
shape and sort, glass cases housing confused collections 
of curious jewellery and trays of unset gems, tiles, mo¬ 
saics, marbles, bronzes, even ancient books and autograph 
letters in frames: things that were worthless, things that 
were priceless, things that were neither, collected and 
herded into anachronistic and otherwise unnatural pro¬ 
miscuity from every period of history and every clime 
and corner of the globe. 

Here and there odd old lamps, capriciously spaced, shed 
freakish shadows that enhanced the illusion of chaos be¬ 
yond repair; and Mr. Manship, peering everywhere for 
some sign of mortal life, was visited by the conceit that 
they were less ordinary shadows he beheld than shades 
of artists dead and gone jealously haunting the deathless 
works of their creation. 

Though he found a smile for the fancy, it was not quite 
sincere. The tintinnabulation dying out in spasms over¬ 
head, only stressed a silence that seemed to hold a curious 
quality of suspense. And he was fairly startled to see 
one of the shadows, as if tardily conjured into life by 
the final flutter of the bell, detach itself from a back¬ 
ground of rich gloom and move toward him by a devious 
way through the clutter. 

But a reassuring slap-slap of roomy slippers accom¬ 
panied its progress; and as it drew nearer the shadow 
took on the shape and substance of a man of middle-age 
or more, powerfully made if overstout in physical deca¬ 
dence, with a rubicund countenance and a cavalier car¬ 
riage—as he might have been Pan turned antiquary, Pan 
masking in a skull cap set at a rakish angle, a shapeless 
coat of black mohair, a permanently corrugated waist¬ 
coat, and trousers so baggy that one could not have said 
whether their wearer were stooping or standing erect. 

Rings of incalculable value, superb stones in massy 
settings, bedizened fat and grimy fingers. A common 


BAROQUE 


3 


crocheted necktie, worn and faded, was knotted through 
a circlet of diamonds. Above rose a head cast in a mould 
of striking nobility, such as one may see minted on old 
Roman coins, though its younger beauty had been de¬ 
based, God knew by what covert indulgences, deep 
pouches sagged below the bold shrewd eyes, the full lips 
had gone slack, the complexion was mottled beneath a 
hoary stubble, and the whole was framed in tufts of griz¬ 
zled hair like an indignant halo. 

The young man civilly saluted: “Mr. Baroque?” 

“I am Mr. Baroque,” said a resonant voice strongly 
touched with Italian accent; and Rodney caught a whiff 
of alcoholic breath—“but so is my brother. Which of us 
do you wish to see?” 

“Mr. Aniello Baroque, I believe.” 

“I am Liborio Baroque. But I will call my brother 
Aniello if you will be pleased to state the nature of your 
business.” 

“I’m not quite sure I understand it myself,” Rodney 
cautiously admitted, offering his professional card. “I 
had a note from your brother this morning, asking me to 
call and advise him on a personal matter.” 

“A personal matter?” Liborio Baroque repeated 
thoughtfully. “A personal matter!” 

But evidently the cunning eyes studied the eyes of can¬ 
dour only to persuade the Italian that to try to pump 
Rodney would be waste of time. And he shrugged and 
led the way to the back of the shop. 

Here, in a sort of office contrived by hedging* off with 
desks and show-cases the recess of a bay-window, he 
unhooked a flexible speaking-tube which hung on one 
side of a decrepit desk, and blew into its mouthpiece a 
stiff blast of potent breath. After a moment the mouth¬ 
piece responded with an asthmatic whistle, whereupon 
the Italian confided to it several words in his native 
tongue. Then he replaced the tube, and with a smile of 
singular charm addressed himself anew to Rodney. 


4 BAROQUE 

“My brother will be here in one minute, signor/’ 

“Thank you.” 

“The day is cold, yes?” Baroque grasped the neck of 
a decanter on a console nearby. “Perhaps a drop to 
warm you up—?” 

“No, thank you very much.” 

“A great pity,” the Italian commented amiably. “One 
is averse to drinking alone.” 

Nevertheless, drink alone he did, and that with gusto; 
and while he was thus engaged his brother entered by 
way of a masked door in the rear wall. 

The appearance of this gentleman was to Rodney a 
cause of genuine astonishment, he was so like Liborio 
Baroque yet so unlike him; physically at least, all that 
Liborio was not, all that he must have been before an 
insiduous if indefinable corruption of the spirit had sealed 
the flesh with its ineffaceable stamp. Feature for feature, 
inch for inch, gesture for gesture, the two were the same 
yet wierdly not the same; as it might have been Satan 
had fashioned Liborio in impish caricature of God’s han¬ 
diwork made manifest in Aniello; or as if Aniello were 
Liborio reflected in some mirror of kindly magic. 

Liborio’s insinuating smile was in Aniello ingratiating; 
the hand that clasped Rodney’s was firm and cordial, the 
voice that welcomed him had all the vibrancy of Liborio’s 
but its modulations had none of the subtile suavity which 
characterized the other. 

Rodney made shift rationally to introduce himself; but 
for the life of him he could not help witlessly looking 
from brother to brother. And observing this, Aniello 
frankly laughed. 

“It is true,” he answered the young man’s unspoken 
thought: “we are much alike in more ways than one, 
Liborio and I, in more than looks alone.” 

“A cross which each bears with due humility,” Liborio 
interposed with affected urbanity. 

“Still, it is not so strange, seeing we are twins.” 


BAROQUE 


5 


“Really?” 

“Born in the same hour — 99 

“As we shall die,” Liborio intoned in a voice like a 
tolling bell. 

Aniello lifted an indulgent eyebrow. 

“But if you will be good enough to come to my study, 
Mr. Manship, we can discuss our business without fear 
of being interrupted by casual customers.” 

“Or your dearly beloved brother,” Liborio amended. 

“Certainly, Mr. Baroque.” 

“Barocco, if you don’t mind,” Aniello corrected pleas^ 
antly. And at this Liborio uttered a short, derisive laugh. 
“It’s true, the firm style is Baroque, but only because we 
found your Anglo-Saxon tongues had trouble pronounc¬ 
ing the family name we brought from Italy, Barocco; 
which, as you of course know, is Italian for ‘baroque/ ” 

“Meaning,” Liborio volunteered—“if one may trust 
your English lexicons— ‘odd, fantastic, bizarre, grotesque, 
in corrupt taste / Ah, well! who knows ? If it comes to 
that, who cares ? Let Aniello remain Barocco, if it pleases 
him: me, I am well content to be Baroque!” 


II 


B Y way of an exceptionally stout door of steel plates 
fitted with a massive lock and bolts, Aniello Barocco 
ushered young Mr. Manship into the entrance-hall of an¬ 
other house altogether, a dwelling of modern type which 
abutted upon the rear of the premises occupied by the 
antique shop. 

This hall, purely Italian in character with its floor of 
black and white tiles, its ceiling beamed and its walls 
panelled in hand-wrought oak, was furnished simply but 
charmingly with substantial old Italian pieces. Through 
the plate glass of a great front door with an iron grille, 
a glimpse was visible of the snow-bound crosstown street. 

Through it, too, in that same instant, a blast of icy air 
entered with a young man in a beautiful fur-lined coat 
and an ugly temper; a singularly handsome boy, unmis¬ 
takably Italian with his oval face, regular features and 
olive colouring; but for traces of effeminacy in both face 
and body—he was as slender and graceful as an adoles¬ 
cent girl—precisely what Aniello must have been at his 
age. 

Stopping short at sight of Barocco and his guest, the 
young man favoured them with a truculent scowl but no 
other sign of recognition, until Aniello addressed him in 
phrases eloquent of patience, affection and sadness, which, 
since they were couched in Italian, Rodney could not 
understand. Neither was the reply more intelligible, 
though no one could have been mistaken about the angry 
defiance with which it was delivered. 

Then the cub shrugged out of his overcoat, tossed it 
with his hat and stick upon a table, and ran lightly up 
the stairs. And Barocco showed Rodney a twisted grim¬ 
ace of apology. 


6 


BAROQUE 7 

“My son, Angelo,” he said simply; but his tone was 
despondent. 

A wave of a gracious hand invited Rodney to the 
stairs; and on the second floor Aniello led the way into 
the library, made his guest comfortable in a roomy chair, 
offered him cigarettes, and to insure their privacy closed 
the folding-doors that communicated with the drawing¬ 
room. 

“You are a younger man than I expected, Mr. Man- 
ship,” he smilingly said, seating himself at his desk. 
“Your father—?” 

“He died shortly after I was admitted to the Bar,” 
Rodney explained. “I looked up our records, when I 
got your note, and found that father had handled a case 
for you several years ago.” 

“I am sorry, Mr. Manship. . . . But as to the business 
I wished to discuss with you, it is simple, merely the 
making of my will—a duty in which I have been inex¬ 
cusably negligent.” 

“But in good company, sir. Most men put off making 
their wills till it’s too late; the few who remember in 
time do so, as a rule, only in the shadow of death. But 
I’m happy to think such is not the case—” 

“No,” Barocco equably agreed. “As for my health, I 
must confess it is excellent. Still, one grows conscious 
that one is getting on. My son is twenty and already, 
he assures me, quite able to take care of himself without 
advice. That makes one think.” 

“You have no other children?” Rodney perfunctorily 
enquired. 

“One other only, Angelo’s twin sister, Francesca.” 

“Truly ?” 

“You find that surprising?” 

“Why! I presume it isn’t, really; still, I don’t recall 
ever hearing of a father, himself a twin, having twin 
children.” 

“And yet—Heaven knows why!—in the history of my 


8 BAROQUE 

family twins have been almost a commonplace occur¬ 
rence.” 

“I should think that must be rather jolly, twins must 
be company for each other.” 

“Such is the general attitude, I know. But with us it 
is otherwise; we Barocci are a superstitious people, and 
the family tradition runs that of twins always one will 
turn out to be ‘baroque/ Regard, for example, my own 
children: Francesca is better than gold—while An¬ 
gelo—!” 

Barocco lifted eloquent eyes ceiling-wards, and sighed 
from his heart. “The boy is out of hand already. His 
mother, who died two years ago, had some little influence 
with him; but for me he cares nothing—nothing! That, 
indeed, is what made me think of my will; for I know 
it would not be well for Angelo to have too much money 
to play fast and loose with. But if you will be amiable 
enough to take a few notes, I will tell you what I have 
in mind.” 

One of the drawers of his desk yielded a steel despatch- 
box and this in turn a number of documents, birth and 
marriage certificates, naturalization papers, and the like, 
which, with Barocco’s statements in general, enabled Rod¬ 
ney to piece together a simple chapter of family history. 

The Barocci, he learned, had for generations been folk 
of consequence in Naples, where Aniello and Liborio had 
been born in 1864. In ’84 the brothers had emigrated to 
America somewhat suddenly and (this was surmised, 
more from what Aniello didn’t say than from what he 
did) in consequence of some escapade of Liborio’s. Set¬ 
tling in New York, they had established their present 
business, and had prospered. 

Liborio had remained single, but in ’95 Aniello had 
married Mary Louise Oliphant, an Englishwoman of 
good family. The twins Francesca and Angelo were 
born in 1900. Seventeen years later their mother died. 

Figures were lacking, but the several properties and 


BAROQUE 


9 


interests which Aniello had to bequeath made up a con¬ 
siderable estate. Setting aside legacies to old servants, 
and a trust fund to be established to pay Angelo a modest 
annuity, everything was to go to the girl Francesca. 

“There,” Barocco rounded off the conference, “I think 
you have it all. But wait: have I perhaps overlooked 
somebody ?” 

“Your brother?” Rodney suggested. 

“Liborio? No: I have not forgotten him. I will tell 
you something which you will think strange, Mr. Man- 
ship—it would be idle to leave anything to Liborio for 
the reason that he will not survive me.” 

Rodney opened his eyes. 

“How can you be sure of that ?” 

“I know what I know. So does Liborio. You heard 
him, I believe.” 

“Why! I do recall his saying something or other—” 

Here Barocco interrupted sharply, lifting a hand to 
enjoin silence while he turned an attentive ear and 
troubled eyes toward the folding-doors; and Rodney on 
his own part appreciated that he had for some minutes 
been subconsciously sensible of a rumour of voices in the 
drawing-room, a murmur in monotones which, of a sud¬ 
den, had risen to a keen pitch of passion—a man’s voice 
and a woman’s beating against each other in bitter dispu¬ 
tation. 

With a worried hiss indrawn between shut teeth, Ba¬ 
rocco thrust back his chair. Simultaneously, in the room 
beyond, a woman cried out loudly, but seemingly in anger 
more than in fear, while the voice of the man fell an 
octave to the inarticulate snarl of a beast enraged. 

As ugly a sound as Rodney had ever heard from human 
lips, that snarl brought him up in quick alarm. Even 
so, and for all his years, Aniello proved the quicker, and 
had thrown open the doors before the younger man was 
fairly out of his chair. But Rodney came abreast of him 
as he stood transfixed by the scene thus disclosed. 


10 


BAROQUE 


Against the glow of a lamp in the farthest corner of 
the room two figures stood and swayed en silhouette, 
locked in combat. The light was insufficient, only by 
their dress was it possible to distinguish that they were 
man and woman; for the latter wore a toque of the mode 
and a voluminous wrap of fur. 

The man was evidently the aggressor; that first glimpse 
showed him viciously forcing the fight, all the efforts of 
the woman being solely to free her throat from his stran¬ 
gling hands. And in this she was abruptly successful, 
with an amazing display of strength and spirit breaking 
his grasp, and at one and the same time flinging him off 
and tripping him. He went down in a sprawl, but before 
his back touched the floor with the agility of a cat re¬ 
bounded and flew back to the attack. 

A blow from the shoulder that would have done credit 
to a professional pugilist stopped this new onslaught. In 
mid-stride the man checked, his head flying back to the 
noise of a stinging crack, in the flutter of an eyelash 
topped and collapsed upon himself, then lay still. 

The woman fell back a pace or two, nursing bruised 
knuckles and watching the shape on the floor with dilate 
eyes in a face bleached by excitement. 

And as the light from the library revealed her features, 
though he had never seen her before, Rodney knew her 
for Francesca Barocco. 

He could hardly be mistaken, nobody could so closely 
resemble the boy who had passed him in the entrance- 
hall but that boy’s twin sister. 

As for Angelo, it was he who lay motionless at Fran¬ 
cesca’s feet. 


Ill 


Tj'ROM first to last what they saw of the quarrel passed 
off so swifly that neither of the men in the doorway 
could have lifted hand to interfere even had surprise not 
held them spellbound. 

The felling of Angelo made an end to that. He had 
hardly dropped before Barocco went into action, making 
for his daughter with long strides, carving the air with 
wild gesticulations, haranguing her in accents aggrieved. 

Either the girl didn’t hear or she didn’t care to hear, 
Aniello’s tirade assailed her as ineffectually at first as a 
torrent dashes against a rock that blocks its channel. 

At length, however, she roused and looked round with 
such a look as one may wear on waking from a vivid 
dream. And after another moment the sense of her 
father’s expostulations came home to her, her eyes lost 
their dazed fixity, her features their tense immobility, 
and returning colour began to tint the warm olive pallor 
of her cheeks. 

“But you saw 1” she cut in impatiently—“you saw what 
he was doing—what he was trying to do—though I was 
beforehand with him there, thank God! Why shouldn’t 
I have struck back, defended myself?” 

Her voice was of contralto quality, her English ex¬ 
quisitely inflected; while the readiness with which she 
used that tongue suggested that it was a choice as in¬ 
stinctive with her as Italian had been with her father. 
It served, moreover, to divert Barocco’s protests into 
English. 

“But why? You must have said something to provoke 
him—!” 


11 


12 


BAROQUE 


“Provoke him!” Francesca laughed contemptuously. 
“Of course I did. It always provokes Angelo to be found 
out—doesn’t it?” 

“What, then, did you say?” 

The girl lifted to Barocco’s face a gaze grave with a 
significance illegible to Rodney. 

“Merely that I knew what he had done last night— 
what you have so long feared.” 

Barocco winced, horror echoed in his voice: “He has 
become novice, he has taken the vows?” 

The girl inclined her head. 

“Madonna mia! You shall not say such things unless 
you are sure! How could you know— ?” 

“Is there anything he can keep hidden from me that 
I care to know ? Or must you have more proof than this, 
that Angelo swore to kill me before I could tell you? 
You saw him try.” 

“Misericordia! your own brother, my own son!” 

“Are you still pitying him?” 

“But consider the sadness, the pity of it, that you two, 
born of one mother in the same hour—!” 

“It was not I who forgot that first.” 

“Look out!” 

The warning was Rodney’s, who to this point had fol¬ 
lowed the dialogue with a natural interest so entire as to 
render him as unmindful of Angelo as they had been. 

But all at once he had become aware that the boy was 
stealthily pulling himself together and preparing to rise. 
And one glimpse of that face with its staring eyes fixed 
upon Francesca, its features distorted in a grimace of 
mortal hatred, had been enough. 

Rodney’s cry and the spring with which Angelo found 
his feet were simultaneous; but so quick was the latter 
that not one of the others had begun to grasp what was 
towards when the boy whipped out a pistol and fired 
point-blank at his sister. 

Haste alone could have betrayed his hand at that little 


BAROQUE 


18 


✓ 



distance. The report reverberated shockingly from wall 
to wall and back again, across the room an inoffensive 
vase upon a pedestal dissolved in shards—but Francesca 
stood untouched. 

Galvanized, Barocco in a bound came between the two, 
and in accents alternately imperative and imploring ad¬ 
jured and enjoined Angelo to put away his weapon. But 
the sole response he got was a flourish of the pistol with 
a curt injunction to stand aside and be quick about it or 
take the consequences. 

Here Rodney provided a diversion by moving toward 
Angelo. A sign with the pistol and a murderous look 
stopped him, and he waited, only edging closer with al¬ 
most imperceptible footwork, while Barocco, standing 
unmoved between death and his daughter, levelled an 
admonitory hand and in a tone singularly tragic uttered 
perhaps a dozen words in Italian. 

On the last word his arm fell, he dropped his chin upon 
his chest and, to the unbounded amazement of Rodney, 
deliberately stepped aside and left the girl exposed. 

Even more confounding was the upshot of this man- 
euvre. Watching Angelo narrowly, weighing the chances 
of losing his life in a sudden flank attack, Rodney saw 
consternation replace madness in the boy’s eyes and pas¬ 
sion ebb swiftly from his countenance, leaving it a 
blanched field for the play of enervating emotions—doubt, 
disquietude, dread, all culminating in a seizure of panic 
terror. 

Rodney closed in quickly; but the hands that laid hold 
of the boy worked his will against no resistance, the 
weapon was yielded him with a readiness which suggested 
that Angelo would have dropped it of his own accord in 
another instant—as if that terror which had seized upon 
his mind had rendered him indifferent to if not actually 
unaware of Rodney’s interference. 

Disarmed, Angelo gave a broken cry, low and inco¬ 
herent, and lifting a tremulous hand like a sign of exor- 


14 BAROQUE 

cism between him and his sister, ran stumbling from the 
room. 

Throwing his daughter a word in haste, Barocco fol¬ 
lowed. 

Alone with the girl, Rodney stood eyeing her dubiously, 
keen to question her, hindered by all manner of reason¬ 
able misgivings. Nothing encouraged him in the regard 
which she bent upon him when the bang of the hall door 
left her free to regain her accustomed composure. 

If she had ever lost it! 

No want of poise was perceptible. To the contrary, 
she appeared to be, no doubt was, far more at ease and 
in command of herself than he. Certainly nobody could 
have guessed she had recently fought for her life there 
in that quiet drawing-room, where only the shattered 
vase and the acrid smell of powder smoke was left to 
tell of the peril she had weathered. 

But how the deuce had she weathered it? . What sor- 
cerous formula had Aniello Barocco pronounced to bring 
that mad young ruffian to his senses ? 

Rodney bowed, smilingly proffered the pistol. 

“Perhaps you’d be good enough to take charge of this, 
Miss Barocco. I’d be glad to see it in safe hands.” 

“Thank you.” The girl coolly took the weapon and 
put it away in a pocket of her wrap. Her self-possession 
remained entire, but she permitted perplexity to knit a 
faint pucker between eyebrows delicately arched. 

“Please!” she directly demanded—“who are you ?” 

“Pardon: my name is Rodney Manship. Your father 
called me in for a consultation. You see, I’m a lawyer.” 

Dismay or something nearly resembling it widened the 
girl’s eyes, she gasped throatily, “A lawyer!” and step¬ 
ping close to Rodney placed an insistent hand upon his 
sleeve. 

“To make his will!” 

It was a statement more than an enquiry, and one to 
which Rodney had no busines to say yes or no. And 


BAROQUE 


15 


as Vie hesitated, seeking a serviceably ambiguous reply, 
the pressure of her fingers grew more pleading. 

“But you won’t tell Angelo, you won’t let him know— !” 

“Rest assured, Miss Barocco, I won’t betray a client’s 
confidence.” 

“But Angelo—promise he shan’t find out—!” 

“He shall learn nothing from me.” 

“If he should, I daren’t think what might happen.” 

“He does seem rather—shall we say temperamental?” 

“ ‘Temperamental!’ ” A laugh short and mirthless 
mocked the term. “I’ll tell you what he is,” she gravely 
offered—“Angelo is a devil.” 

“From what I’ve seen, I find that easy to believe.” 

“Oh! it’s true, I know him—as nobody else knows him, 
I know Angelo. Some day, if I am not careful, he’ll 
murder me in one of his rages. He would have done so 
just now, if he hadn’t been afraid.” 

“He didn’t seem afraid to try—” 

“No—not till father reminded him that, if he did kill 
me, he would die himself.” 

Rodney wasted a moment in a wondering stare. Then 
—“Oh!” he exclaimed—“I see what you mean. I dare¬ 
say that is the best argument in support of capital pun¬ 
ishment—that fear of the electric chair makes many a 
would-be killer stop and think.” 

Francesca shook her head. “That wasn’t what fright¬ 
ened Angelo. Fear of the law would never influence 
him.” 

“Then—what—in the name of reason did?” 

“Why! of course, because we’re twins.” 

The young woman seemed to think she had made every¬ 
thing clear, and betrayed some impatience when Rodney 
confessed himself still at a loss. 

“Don’t you know twins always die at the same time? 
—that one never survives the other by more than a day 
at most?” 


16 BAROQUE 

“I am acquainted with the superstition, naturally, 
but—” 

“Call it superstition if you like: we know it to be a 
fatal fact. There have been twins in our family more 
than once, and always they have died on the same day. 
So we know that when father dies, my Uncle Liborio 
will—that when I die, Angelo must.” 

At this juncture, Barocco with a sombre countenance, 
returned; and running to him, the girl threw herself into 
his arms. He held her close, gently patting her shoulder, 
murmuring ineffective words of reassurance and endear¬ 
ment. 

“Well ?” she anxiously queried. 

Barocco lifted and let fall hands of despair. 

“What did he say ?” 

“He would not listen—took his hat and coat and left 
the house to go back—to them!” 

The girl gave a cry of protest: “Ah, no, no!” 

“Where else should he turn when he leaves my roof? 
We know that he has gone to them—God forgive him!” 

“And help us!” Francesca prayed. 


IV 


TTHUS it came to pass that Rodney Manship took home 
that night more to make him thoughtful than his 
memoranda of the wishes of Aniello Barocco concerning 
the testamentary parcelling of his property. 

And being an utterly normal young man endowed with 
a normal quantum of human curiosity, he fairly itched 
with the mystification excited by what he had learned in 
the house of the Barocci—if more by what he hadn’t. 

Leaving all else out of account, there was food enough 
for wonder in that double mystery of consanguinity. 
How, out of that closest relationships in nature, could 
two beings have come so unalike in all but the superficial 
flesh as Aniello with his simple dignity and gentleness 
and that swashbuckling blade, his twin brother, Liborio ? 
Or that passionate boy with his face of a faun and the 
cool, contained young person who was his twin sister— 
with her face of fatality! 

The purity of its beauty alone would have made that 
face memorable, but what rendered it unforgettable was 
the pensive loveliness of dark eyes sweetly grave and 
remote, with a look of mystery and melancholy, as though 
they envisaged unafraid an isolate and tragic destiny— 
a look of fatality indeed. 

One or two women in an age are set apart by that 
look. They are greatly loved, they suffer greatly. But 
rarely Life is kind, and love comes last. . . . 

Not unnaturally Manship put aside more important 
matters in favour of the will; and the third evening 
found him once more in the library with Barocco. But 

17 


18 


BAROQUE 


on this occasion Francesca was not in evidence, and her 
father found no cause to speak of her until, their confer¬ 
ence concluded, Rodney ventured to delay his departure 
with a discreet amenity. 

Miss Barocco was well, he hoped, had suffered no ill 
effects from the—ah—excitement of the other evening? 

“If Francesca were upset by every quarrel she has 
with Angelo, she would have to spend most of her time 
recovering. But she is above that. A noble nature, gen¬ 
erous and forgiving”—Barocco sighed heavily—“as noble 
as Angelo is—otherwise. Unhappy boy!” 

“I wonder if you’d mind telling just what you said 
to make him give up that gun without a struggle.” 

“I told him not to forget Francesca was his twin sister, 
that he couldn’t kill her without committing suicide.” 

“And he believed that!” 

“Why not ? He knows my grandfather and his brother, 
who were twins, died simultaneously; and so did my aunt 
and her twin sister.” 

“Odd! I'd heard the thing talked about, of course, 
but never imagined anybody took it seriously.” 

“There are many odd things in life, Mr. Manship, we 
must take seriously, the psychic affinity between twins 
not least among them. Haven’t you noticed how they’re 
seldom happy out of each other’s sight? It is so with 
Liborio and me, for example. If you knew us better 
you’d say our natures had little in common—yet we are 
inseparable. If I didn’t know where to find Liborio, if 
I were not sure all was well with him, I should be beside 
myself. And though Liborio holds me in contempt, 
because our tastes and ways are not the same, he can’t 
bear to live apart from me.” 

“Astonishing!” 

“It’s like that with my children, too. Angelo left us 
that night meaning never to return; he has stood it out 
nearly three days, now the necessity to be near his sister 


BAROQUE 


19 


brings him back, nothing else. I have just had a tele¬ 
phone message that he is on his way home.” 

“And Miss Barocco—has she been unhappy in his ab¬ 
sence ?” 

“Probably not so much as Angelo, but more than she 
let me see. She has extraordinary strength of character, 
sublime fortitude of soul. She is capable of suffering 
greatly, without a murmur—where Angelo would make 
everybody miserable with his self-pity and complaints. 
Francesca is more keen mentally, as well, and has other 
gifts that have been denied her brother. She can read 
his mind in a measure, but he can never read hers. That's 
one reason why he resents and hates her so, because he’s 
terrified by her intuitions. Yet he hasn’t the strength 
to stay away.” 

Rodney made conventional noises of sympathy, but 
Barocco was inattentive. 

“It sums up to this,” he said, with his patient smile: 
“they are like two pearls; but one is perfect and one— 
baroque.” 

As Rodney lingered on the doorstep, drawing on his 
gloves and making up his mind whether to walk home 
by way of Madison Avenue or Fifth, a venerable ark of 
a taxicab rocked round the corner and, quaking with 
senile palsy, drew up at the curb. From it emerged 
Angelo. 

He looked like the very devil. Still clothed as on their 
first encounter, he might have been sleeping in his gar¬ 
ments ever since, so wrinkled were they and out of shape. 
His eyes were bloodshot and sunken, a three days’ beard 
darkened his chin and jowls, the tremulous hands were 
chapped red with which he dragged from his pocket a 
few, wadded bills and selected one for his chauffeur. 

His appearance as a whole was, in short, simply 
shocking, and made one wonder precisely what it was 
that the partisans of Prohibition imagined they were 
prohibiting. 


20 


BAROQUE 


Uncertain recognition flickered in the half-glazed eyes 
that rested on Rodney, nothing more; and Rodney made 
off unaware of the fact that Angelo had suddenly remem¬ 
bered and was favouring the view of his back with a 
scowl of pure spite. 


V 


T> ECAUSE Aniello Barocco, his will once drawn and 
executed, seemed to consider the incident closed, 
Rodney wasted many an hour trying to devise some pre¬ 
text for reintroducing himself in any easy, natural fashion 
to the ken of Barocco’s daughter. But scruples, diffi¬ 
dence, and over-anxiety so hampered his ingenuity that 
the upshot was absolute exasperation and only that. 

A week, one everlasting week, had been irretrievably 
lost out of life when events took a turn favourable to 
his desires, and yet another wintry nightfall brought him 
again to the residence adjoining the antique shop of 
Baroque Brothers. 

The aged Italian manservant who answered his ring 
dispassionately averred that Signor Aniello Barocco was 
not at home. 

But Miss Barocco, perhaps—? 

Desolatingly it appeared that the signorina likewise 
was abroad. For all that, there was no knowing when 
she or her father might not return. If the signor cared 
to come in and wait . . . 

Rodney said that he wouldn’t come in, thank you, he’d 
just step into the shop and have a look round, if the 
servant would be good enough to let Mr. Barocco 
know . . . 

It was an hour later than the time of his first visit, 
and that much darker. The warning tinkle of the little 
bell was like an open sesame to some cavern of en¬ 
chanted gloom permeated with the exotic warmth and 
fragrance of Arabian nights; merely to penetrate its 
portals was to experience a sense of adventuring across 

21 


22 


BAROQUE 


a magic threshold into a realm of wonders where anything 
but the commonplace was possible. 

As had not been the case on that first occasion, there 
were several customers in evidence, whom the inadequate 
illumination revealed as vague shades wandering through 
a labyrinth of shadows. The light of a closely-shaded 
lamp discovered the portly and florid Liborio at a counter 
near the door, showing trays of jewellery to the pretty 
tenant of Russian sables and a pair of sheer silk stockings 
the hue of silver. Seeing Rodney come in, he cocked 
a genial eye his way, nodded, and waved a casual hand 
as who should say: “Make yourself at home, my friend 
—but wait your turn!” 

So for twenty minutes or more Rodney humoured his 
whim unhindered, prowling and coveting—till unex¬ 
pectedly an idle turn round a screen of burning cinnabar 
brought him to the door that communicated with the 
Barocco home, at the precise instant when it was flung 
violently open to admit Francesca or her living image. 

The face of fatality had so long held first place in his 
thoughts that it never occurred to Rodney to question 
the likeness until, hat in hand and heart in mouth, his 
lively smile was met and chilled by a glare of hostility. 

Then seeing how he had been misled, by the very 
eagerness of his desire as much as by the wretched light¬ 
ing, he clapped his hat back on his head and, reddening, 
began to blurt excuses. 

“Oh! pardon, Mr. Baroque. I thought—I mean to 
say—” 

“Well—now you see your mistake—what d’you want?” 

“I beg your pardon?” 

“What are you doing here ? What do you want ?” 

“Why!” Rodney explained with his most winning 
smile—“I just dropped in to see how unmannerly you 
could be without provocation. And now you have dem¬ 
onstrated so handsomely, permit me to bid you good day.” 

He bowed mockingly and swung about. 


BAROQUE 


23 


“One moment!” In a cat-like bound Angelo planted 
himself in Rodney’s way. “If you’re waiting to see my 
father, I’ll give him your message—” 

“You’re too good. Besides, I haven’t said I wanted to 
see your father.” 

“Well! if you’re sticking round in hope of seeing my 
sister, let me tell you—” 

“Your sister will speak for herself, thank you, Angelo.” 

Cool, amused accents pronounced the interruption; 
Francesca stood beside them, having come in a moment 
after Angelo. And the wonder with which Rodney real¬ 
ized anew the warm carnation of her face, aglow from 
the sharp air and, framed in dark furs, lovelier even than 
in his dreams, blotted out of mind all the graceful 
speeches he had prepared against such a meeting as this, 
by accident prepense. He was able only to stammer 
feebly when, with a friendly smile, she gave him a gloved 
hand. 

“How do you do, My. Manship. You mustn’t mind 
Angelo, he can’t help being himself, he’s so young—such 
a child that I never can explain how it happens he’s my 
twin. You wanted to see father? He’ll be home di¬ 
rectly, I’m sure. Do come in and let me give you tea 
while you wait.” 

Utterly discountenanced, his slender, effeminate body 
quivering, his features nervously working, Angelo made 
no offer to accompany them, but remained rooted in 
chagrin, glaring at the doorway through which they 
disappeared. 

The girl’s casual and tolerant manner changed, once 
she and Rodney were alone. 

“I’m so sorry, Mr. Manship. Angelo grows more 
hopeless every day.” 

“It doesn’t matter. I quite understand.” 

“But—that’s just it—you don’t, really. I can’t explain, 
either. It’s a family secret—the skeleton in our cup¬ 
board. And yet I must make you understand somehow. 


24* BAROQUE 

he’s dangerous, actually dangerous. And if I might ask 
a favour—” 

“I can’t think of anything you couldn’t ask of me!” 

“To avoid Angelo as much as possible—” 

“I’ll do my best, though I doubt if there’ll be another 
occasion.” 

“Thank you. And now”—Francesca turned to the 
staircase—“let’s have tea. I’ve been walking, and I’m 
famished.” 

The tea service was ready upon a table in a corner of 
the drawing-room, beneath the standing lamp; and a 
ring brought a manservant with boiling water. 

“But I wonder,” Rodney suggested, watching the girl 
busy herself with the cups—“yes, please, two, and cream 
—I wonder if you’re wise. I mean, about your brother. 
If you ask me, what you said to him just now—or the 
way you said it—annoyed him far more than I had.” 

“Oh! I’m not afraid of Angelo. I can manage him. 
It’s Angelo who is afraid of me, you know. I can say 
and do what I like—he daren’t touch me.” 

“He forgot that once, he may again.” 

“No fear,” she lightly laughed. “Besides, it’s either 
the attitude I’ve adopted, or give in to him altogether 
—and thafs unthinkable. But,” she added, giving Rod¬ 
ney his cup, “let’s talk of happier things. Father, for 
instance. I’m sorry he’s late.” 

“I’ve got something to tell Mr. Barocco,” Rodney 
ventured. “I don’t know that it’s important enough—and 
yet it’s strange. I’d like to know what you think, if you 
don’t mind.” 

“Please—and smoke when you like.” 

She settled back to listen, a gracious figure posed gra¬ 
ciously in the rich lamp-light, with eyes so flatteringly 
attentive that Rodney had trouble keeping his mind on 
his tongue. 

“Of course,” he said, “it may all turn out to be a 
mare’s-nest, but—well!—the other day somebody got 


BAROQUE 


25 


into my rooms by way of the fire-escape, and ransacked 
my desk. Nothing was stolen, but the lock on the desk 
was smashed and all my private papers were in disorder.” 

“How funny!” 

“Wait. Last night my offices downtown were burg¬ 
larized. The thieves jimmied the door, broke open desks, 
and wrecked the safe. A big risk to run for the sake of 
their haul—a handful of petty cash and some stamps. 
The safe is mainly used to store legal papers in. Any¬ 
thing of real value I always put in my safe-deposit vault 
at the bank. The thieves tore out all those papers, went 
through file after file, littered the floor with them. We 
had the deuce of a job sorting them out and checking up 
to find what was missing—” 

“I know.” 

“You know!” 

The girl sat up with a gesture of keen distress. 

“I’ve known all day something was wrong, something 
had happened Angelo didn’t want me to know about— 
he’s been keeping out of my way so persistently.” 

“I’m sorry, Miss Barocco, I didn’t mean—I didn’t 
come here to accuse your brother—” 

“You haven’t. I accuse him.” 

“But there’s not the slightest evidence—” 

“It’s father’s will that’s missing, isn’t it?” 

“Yes; that is, the office copy. The original is in safe 
deposit. I thought your father ought to know; but of 
course it never entered my head—” 

“Oh! I don’t say Angelo actually stole it with his own 
hands. But that he instigated the burglary, when he 
didn’t find what he was looking for in your rooms, I’m 
morally certain—as sure as I am that at this very minute 
he’s eavesdropping out there in the hall!” 

Of a sudden she left her chair and ran toward the door¬ 
way, heels clicking on hardwood spaces between the rugs, 
but half-way halted and threw Rodney a look of sorry 
satisfaction, the tilt of her head inviting him to listen. 


26 


BAROQUE 


A sound of hurried feet upon the stairs was audible 
with, a moment later, the slam of the street door. The 
girl shrugged contemptuously, went to the windows, drew 
back the draperies, and peered down. 

“It would be like Angelo to bang the door, then steal 
back upstairs to listen. ... No: there he goes.” 

Her smile was pitiful as she returned to Rodney. 

“You see what it is I must call brother 1” 

“I’m so sorry, Miss Barocco . . .” 

“It can’t be helped,” she sighed—“it is fate, I presume. 
Always, they say, one of the twins must be ‘baroque/ 
And what can one do ? What can any one do who doesn’t 
know what that young devil has in mind? He keeps 
away from me, you see, for fear lest I should find him 
out; for I have a way of finding out his secrets. But 
now—!” 

Her hands described a movement of helplessness. 

“What do you fear?” 

“Everything. If I dared speak frankly . . . But I 
must keep the family secrets, I can only tell you this: 
that now Angelo knows he has been disinherited—” 

“Not altogether: he’s down for a small annuity.” 

“The same thing to Angelo. He’s a spendthrift and 
a gambler; merely enough to live on means poverty to 
him. What little effort he has made, up to this time, to 
keep up an outward show of decency was inspired not by 
affection for father, moral compunctions, or any sense of 
shame, but simply by avarice—because he was afraid of 
what has happened, that he’d be cut off with a shilling. 
And now he knows, he’ll stop at nothing to make his 
resentment felt.” 

“What can he do?” 

“If I only knew!” Francesca wrung her hands. 
“Don’t think me hysterical. I’m not—but half-distracted. 
It’s in Angelo’s power to bring disaster and disgrace to 
all of us—and I tell you, he’s capable of anything!” 

In the library a telephone bell shrilled. Francesca ex- 


BAROQUE 


27 


cused herself and went to answer it, delivering into the 
transmitter a stream of Italian so rapid and fluent that 
Rodney wondered how the person at the other end of 
the wire contrived to edge in a reply. 

But quite evidently he did it without too much diffi¬ 
culty, for when the girl came back it was with the an¬ 
nouncement : 

“Father won’t be home till quite late; but I told him 
what you had told me, and he says he’d like to see you 
this evening, if possible.” 

“Of course: I’ll be glad. At what time?” 

“Any time after dinner, say nine o’clock, if that suits 
your convenience.” 

“Perfectly—and if it didn’t I should make my conve¬ 
nience suit it.” 

She gave him her hand again. 

“You are very kind.” 

“I’d be happy if I thought so—or that you wouldn’t 
hesitate to call on me, Miss Barocco, if ever I can do 
anything, not as a lawyer but—if you will permit me to 
call myself—a friend.” 

The dark eyes grew dim with wistfulness. 

“Even troubles have their uses, Mr. Manship, when 
they bring us friends.” 


VI 


T O appear in evening clothes when making an after- 
dinner call even of a semi-business nature implies 
(in the lovely language of that enervating authority who 
tutors us gratis in theatre programs) the debonnaire 
habit; it lends an undeniable cachet. And an undeniable 
cachet being one of the most potent lures an enterprising 
swain can sport in the sight of the lady who holds his 
heart in fee—it will be readily understood why, although 
he was dining alone at his club, Mr. Manship dressed 
for dinner that night, and dressed with particular pains. 

For by this time Rodney was no more in doubt as to 
the simple nature of his trouble. The face of fatality 
had proved his fate, free will and fancy were no longer 
his. 

The night was clear and still, its tonic cold rendered 
walking a delight, the stroll from the club was just long 
enough. With his nose in the air and his head in the 
clouds, Rodney approached the street on which the home 
of the Barocci stood, but on the point of turning to 
cross Fifth Avenue caught sight of Angelo Barocco on 
the down-town corner, and pulled up to watch the boy 
and wonder what mischief he was up to now. 

Angelo was skulking somewhat back from the corner, 
in the half-shadow of a department store. A fur collar 
turned up to his ears, the brim of a soft hat pulled down 
over his eyes, gaze intent upon the neighbourhood of 
his home, to the east of the Avenue—his pose altogether 
was that of a spying prowler, high-strung with excite¬ 
ment and fearful of detection. 

28 


BAROQUE 


29 


And as if to prove it was mischief he had in mind, he 
took fright when Rodney’s halt on the up-town corner 
warned him he had attracted attention, with a nervous 
start swinging round and slinking off toward Sixth Ave¬ 
nue—thereby dissipating all doubt as to his identity, for 
there could be no mistaking that feline grace which was 
peculiarly his. 

To the riddle of this conduct nothing in the immediate 
surroundings of the Barocco residence provided any key. 
The mid-evening quiet was normal, wheeled traffic was 
entirely wanting save on the avenues, footfarers were 
few. Across the way a shape in the gray uniform of a 
private watchman was on leisurely patrol, and a couple 
whose mutual passion no frost could chill were sauntering 
in close harmony. On the corner occupied by the antique 
shop two men of no particular points stood talking, 
apparently about to part company. 

Part they did as Rodney stopped in the Barocco door¬ 
way, one vanishing down Madison Avenue, the other 
moving west toward Fifth. Drawing near, this last pro¬ 
duced a cigar, worried off its end with his teeth, spat 
spiritedly, and swerved in. 

“Say, young feller: got a match?” 

Rodney nodded, distrustfully eyeing the man as he 
handed over a folder of paper matches. But when the 
little flame flared up it ruddled a countenance, plain of 
feature and not too intellectual of cast, that he knew. 

“Why, hello, Ritchey!” 

Shrewd grey eyes blinked at Rodney above the fire. 

“Oh! it’s you, Mr. Manship.” 

“How’s sleuthing nowadays?” 

“Pretty dull,” the man replied, throwing away the 
match and poisoning the sweet night air with puffs of 
rank smoke. 

“Wouldn’t think you’d find much to do up in this 
neighbourhood, Ritchey.” 

“No,” the police detective agreed, “you wouldn’t, would 


30 


BAROQUE 


you? Well: a guy’s got to have some time off the job, 
same as yourself, Mr. Manship; I guess you ain’t out 
on business either, in that open-faced suit.” 

“Wrong, Ritchey!” Rodney laughed: “one of my 
clients lives here. You see it isn’t always safe to judge 
a man by the cut of his jibs.” 

“No,” Ritchey admitted, shifting the cigar from one 
corner to the other of his mouth—“I guess that’s right, 
all right.” And then, as the door opened and soft light 
washed the entrance, “Well, g’dnight,” he added, and 
ambled on. 

Aniello Barocco was waiting alone in the library; and 
the face he lifted up in the light of his desk-lamp when 
Rodney entered had aged shockingly since their last 
meeting. The eyes were haggard that had been so frank 
and confident, the hand was listless that clasped Rod¬ 
ney’s—all that robust gesture of yesterday had wasted 
into infirmity. 

“You aren’t ill, I hope, Mr. Barocco?” 

A careworn smile failed to carry reassurance. “It’s 
nothing, Mr. Manship, thank you; nothing, at least, that 
knows any remedy; worry aggravating an old trouble of 
the heart . . .” 

Finding he had unconsciously lifted a hand to press 
above his heart, Barocco dropped it with a grimace of 
impatience. 

“But please sit down. And thank you for coming. I 
hope it hasn’t inconvenienced you; but after hearing 
what Francesca had to tell me, it seemed essential I 
should see you tonight. Mr. Manship: I appeal to your 
generosity.” 

“My dear sir!” Rodney exclaimed in astonishment. 

“I throw myself and my family upon your mercy,” 
Barocco proceeded earnestly. “We have every reason 
to believe my son is at the bottom of the annoyances you 
have suffered; not that I believe Angelo took active part 
in the burglaries, but that I’m afraid, in his determina- 


BAROQUE 


31 


tion to learn the nature of my will, he was responsible. 
... I gather there were no clues?” 

“I believe the Headquarters men collected a few fin¬ 
gerprints.” 

“Then I have to beg you not to make use of the knowl¬ 
edge which you have gained from Francesca and my¬ 
self, not to report your suspicions to the police.” 

“I shouldn’t have dreamed of doing so without first 
asking your consent.” 

“I thank you.” Wagging a heavy head, Barocco pur¬ 
sued: ‘‘Age plays the devil with us, Mr. Manship. No, 
but it is too true: I am not the man I was, I am no longer 
fit to cope with problems that would once have seemed 
trifling. Mark how I have blundered trying to deal with 
Angelo. And now that I must pay the penalty of failure, 
I have no heart at all to face it with.” 

“But surely you exaggerate, sir. What if Angelo does 
resent the loss of his expectations? His conduct, you 
assure me, has earned him his disinheritance. And what 
can he do?” 

The lacklustre eyes met Rodney’s in a stare of melan¬ 
choly foreboding. 

“I cannot tell you,” Barocco said—“I dare not tell you 
what I fear.” 

From an unseen source near his elbow a strident 
whistle sounded. He bent over wearily and unhooked 
from under his desk the speaking-tube that linked the 
library with the antique shop. Uttering into the mouth¬ 
piece a brief response in Italian, he held it to his ear. 

What he heard must have been communicated in few 
words, since he dropped the tube almost immediately; 
yet their import was enough to kindle panic in his eyes, 
blanch his face, and bring him to his feet in one startled 
movement. 

But then strength seemed momentarily to forsake him, 
he faltered and swayed, resting a hand on the desk for 
support. And Rodney, rising hastily, offered his arm 


32 BAROQUE 

together with his sympathy, whatever the nature of the 
blow. 

Fugitive appreciation flickered in the dazed eyes, the 
lips moved feebly but without sound other than a harsh 
rustle of breathing slow and laboured. 

“What is it, Mr. Barocco? You are ill—let me call 
your daughter.” 

A shaking hand peremptorily negatived the suggestion. 
In a deep voice of woe Barocco pronounced a single 
Italian word unintelligible to his hearer, then stumbled 
from the room. 

Delaying a mere instant in doubt what to do, Rodney 
followed, and in the hallway all but ran into the arms 
of Francesca coming from the drawing-room. He drew 
back quickly, with a stammered apology, and the girl, 
catching his arm, called after her father in his native 
tongue. Barocco, now half-way down the stairs, de¬ 
scending with hasty, dragging feet, made no answer. He 
disappeared, they heard his shuffling footsteps in the 
entrance hall. 

“What is it?” Francesca demanded. “What has hap¬ 
pened ?” 

“I don’t know—some message from the shop alarmed 
him. Hadn’t we better—?” 

But already Francesca was running after her father. 

At her heels Rodney passed through the door in the 
party wall, once more cast as supernumerary in a scene 
of drama in the history of this strange family. 

Aniello Barocco, with a countenance of alarming pal¬ 
lor, breathing with difficulty, his mouth twisted with 
pain, his legs trembling as if about to buckle with his 
weight, was leaning on one of the showcases that fenced 
apart the makeshift office and the body of the shop. Her 
arms round him, Francesca was looking up anxiously 
into her father’s face, seemingly forgetful of everything 
but her fears for him. 

At a little distance Liborio was holding a pose of 


BAROQUE 


33 


complete nonchalance, back to and elbows planted upon 
the glass top of another showcase. A leer defiant and 
ironic wreathed his features but was without reflection 
in eyes that seemed sly and wary. Indifferent to his 
brother’s distress, he was giving his attention to three 
business-like if otherwise unprepossessing men who were 
engaged in rummaging the desk and the several chests 
and cabinets which stood inside the office space. An¬ 
other, the police detective Ritchey, was facing Liborio 
with a grin of triumph and, in his hand, a document of 
some sort, undoubtedly a warrant. 

A fifth detective guarded the Madison Avenue en¬ 
trance, at the back of the shop a sixth stood sentinel 
near the iron door. 

Out of the corner of an eye Ritchey spied Rodney, and 
forthwith hailed him: “Hello, Mr. Manship! nothing like 
being the lawyer on the spot when the big smash hap¬ 
pens, is there?” 

“Ritchey!” Rodney demanded, striding over to con¬ 
front the police detective—“what the devil—?” 

“Give you one guess, Mr. Mhnship. I’m still on the 
Narcotic Squad—and I won’t get sent back to pound 
sidewalks for what I’m pulling off tonight, neither.” 

“But it can’t be possible—!” 

“Maybe you’re as innocent as you make out, maybe 
not,” Ritchey commented with a grim smile. “Thought 
you said you was these birds’ lawyer? Maybe they 
don’t tell Friend Lawyer all their secrets at that; but 
you ought to know what kind of clients you’ve got; and 
if you don’t, I’ll tell you and the world they’re the king¬ 
pins of the dope-smuggling machine in this country.” 

“I don’t believe it!” 

Rodney looked to Aniello Barocco, but the grey mis¬ 
ery of that face would have silenced him even if he had 
been insensible to Francesca’s glance of pitiful appeal. 
While all he got from Liborio was a leer and a shrug. 

“You must be mistaken, Ritchey—” 


34 


BAROQUE 


“Now, listen, Mr. Manship: you ought to know I 
wouldn’t take no chance of being ‘broke’ for a bonehead 
play. I got the goods on these guys, been laying for 
them for years; and today when the tip come through—” 

“Tip?” Liborio Baroque put in with an amused, in¬ 
credulous inflection. 

“I said tip. Some of your Wop friends leaked, Ba¬ 
roque. What they didn’t tell us wasn’t worth knowing. 
We got you right now, we know all about how you been 
getting the stuff smuggled in with antique truck from 
abroad and distributing it by reselling your shipments 
piecemeal to other antique dealers. Why! Mr. Manship, 
for twenty years this nice, quiet, respectable little shop 
in a nice, quiet, respectable neighbourhood has been the 
clearing house for fifty per cent of the dope trade in the 
United States.” 

Liborio greeted this statement with a derisive flash of 
teeth. 

“A pretty story, very pret-ty; but without evidence, 
who will believe?” 

“Evidence!” Ritchey echoed indignantly. “Lis’n, 
friend: I’ll show you all the evidence you want inside 
five minutes. If you hadn’t turned up when you did, Mr. 
Manship, and made me leary that maybe you’d tip your 
friends off, saying something about meeting me, I 
wouldn’t ’ve hopped the joint until I could ’ve caught 
this bird in the act of selling over the counter. We had 
it all fixed for one of his regulars to drop in and buy a 
paper of snow—sure! he does a retail business, too— 
but after I seen you, I didn’t dare wait. And if Baroque 
here thinks we don’t know—” 

He broke off as, with an exclamation, one of his asso¬ 
ciates straightened up from a cabinet of Chinese lacquer 
in the office space. 

“What you got, Norton?” 

“Only about enough heroin to give every man, woman 
and child in N’York the jazz for a week,” the other 


BAROQUE 


35 


replied with a chuckle. But his next breath was wasted 
in a yell of warning coincident with a tremendous crash 
of furniture and crockery. 

With an exhibition of readiness and agility amazing 
in a man of his age, Liborio had taken advantage of the 
first moment when the attention of Ritchey was diverted. 
His fist, carrying all his might, drove the detective head¬ 
long backward over a low tabouret and into the cinnabar 
screen, which promptly toppled over upon a table of old 
lustre and Venetian glassware. 

Without pause Liborio plunged for the front of the 
shop. The man at the door ran to tackle him, but the 
Italian swerved, found a way through the crowded floor, 
and leaped upon the low ledge of one of the show-win¬ 
dows. 

A mahogany pedestal stood there, among other pieces, 
supporting a marble bust. Liborio dislodged the latter 
—the wooden flooring boomed to its impact like a bass- 
drum—and catching up the pedestal whirled it round 
his head as if it were a broomstick. 

The guardian of the front door, making an ill-advised 
attempt to close in, was sent sprawling by one blow of 
the pedestal. Its next fell with shattering force upon 
the window, and the huge sheet of plate glass rang like 
cracked bell-metal, then, shivering into a thousand frac¬ 
tions, vanished almost bodily, leaving a wide opening 
framed with jagged teeth. 

The rain of fragments was still clanging and clatter¬ 
ing upon the sidewalk when Liborio dropped the pedestal 
and prepared to leap out. In that act he reared up to 
his full height, tottering, and fell back, shot through by 
a bullet from a pistol which the detective Norton had 
fired close by Rodney’s ears. 

Half-deafened, confused with horror and dismay, Rod¬ 
ney heard Francesca call out in terror, and looked round 
to see her bending beneath the weight of her father, 
whose limbs seemed to be refusing their office, so that 


36 


BAROQUE 


he could neither stand nor hold himself up by the arm 
which he had flung over the showcase. His face was 
ghastly, his jaw had dropped, his eyes, more than half- 
shut, revealed only slits of white beneath drooping lids. 

In alarm Rodney moved toward the two, but the girl 
waved him back with a frantic hand, pointing to the 
broken window. 

“No!” she panted—“go—find out—!” 

Rodney turned, to be shouldered aside by Ritchey as 
that one, cursing, scrambled up from the debris of his 
downfall and ran toward the spot where the guardian 
of the door was picking himself up, nursing a bruised 
shoulder, and where Norton already was bending over 
the fallen Liborio. 

Rising as Rodney came up with Ritchey, Norton 
greeted them with an uneasy grin. 

“Damn’ gun of mine kicks like a mule: aimed at his 
legs and got him through the heart.” 

“Dead!” 

“Worse luck! I’ll have a hell of a time explaining 
why I had to shoot—and all the newspapers yelling 
bloody murder and printing pieces about a corrupt and 
brutalized police force.” 

A sudden commotion, voices of men lifted in warning, 
the girl crying out in fright, drew them away from the 
dead man. 

Aniello Barocco had collapsed in his daughter’s arms. 
Three detectives, the guard at the rear door and the 
two who had stopped behind in the office, had rushed to 
her assistance in time to relieve the girl of the burden 
of her father and let him gently to the floor. Kneeling 
by his side, she was wildly demanding that somebody 
summon medical assistance. 

“Telephone for an ambulance,” Ritchey ordered. 

“Let me have a look,” Rodney interposed—“know a 
bit about first aid—served with the ambulance corps in 
France.” 


BAROQUE 


37 


On his knees he tore open the waistcoat and shirt and 
placed a hand above the heart. After a moment he laid 
his cheek close by Aniello’s mouth. A shake of his head 
as he sat back confirmed the fact of death. He dared 
not look at Francesca. 

Giving way to a passion of grief and despair, the girl 
threw herself upon the bosom of her father. 

And presently Rodney got up and stood back, with head 
bowed, stricken to the heart with pity, his intelligence 
shaken by a great wonder. 

Even as the brothers had foretold, in the same 

hour . . . 


VII 


A LONE in the library of the Barocco home, Manship 
sat writing. His pen moved slowly, he was frown¬ 
ing fretfully to find that concentration demanded un¬ 
wonted effort. It was late, he was more tired than he 
knew, the words he needed were unaccountably elusive. 

After half a dozen essays had been consigned serially 
to the waste-basket, he was still trying, still dissatisfied. 

“My dear Miss Barocco: 

“The sympathy of a comparative stranger can 
hardly fail, I am afraid, to seem intrusive. But I 
trust you will permit me to offer mine, and believe 
in it in spite of my poor efforts to express it. 

“It is past midnight now, I cannot think of any 
way in which I can be useful, and I do not like to 
disturb you by sending a servant to enquire. So I 
shall leave this to be given you in the morning. 

“I hope very truly you will not hesitate to make 
every possible use of my services, which are wholly 
yours to command. The telephone will always find 
me at either my home or my office. 

“At your convenience, as you may care to desig¬ 
nate it, I shall be glad to bring and read to you your 
father’s will. May I suggest that you ask your 
brother to be present, as well as the other legatees—” 

He paused with lifted pen, trying to recollect their 
names. 

The house was still. The police surgeon and the fam¬ 
ily physician had long since come and gone, the bodies 
of the two brothers had been carried upstairs, Francesca 
had disappeared, with, for company and comfort in her 

38 


BAROQUE 


39 


grief, an old Italian servant of the family who had been 
her nurse. In the shop below, behind drawn shades and 
a window roughly boarded, the men of the Narcotic 
Squad, tardily reenforced by a detail of Internal Revenue 
operatives, were continuing their rummage for contra¬ 
band drugs. Outside, on the corner, a patrolman was 
stationed to keep the over-inquisitive moving. 

For minutes on end Rodney sat with perplexed eyes 
staring at nothing. Doubts and confusion still rode his 
mind. Impossible to reconcile the impression Aniello 
Barocco had conveyed, of fine simplicity and high-minded 
honesty, with his proved character of accomplice in the 
illegal drug traffic. 

And Francesca—she, too, had known! 

Rodney could almost as readily have believed himself 
guilty . . . 

His abstraction was dissipated by a heavy tread upon 
the stairs. Hands in pockets, derby pushed back on his 
head, complacency and a dead cigar decorating his coun¬ 
tenance, Detective Sergeant Ritchey strolled in. 

‘‘Thought I’d look in and say g’dnight, Mr. Manship.” 

Rodney roused with an effort. 

“All finished, Ritchey?” 

“Yeah—call it a night. Cleaned up pretty; must be a 
couple hundred thousand dollars’ worth of dope they’re 
loadin’ into the wagon now. Say! them Internal Rev- 
enoo birds ’re the sickest lookin’ lot y’ever seen, the way 
us hick cops put it over ’em. If it wasn’t for that shootin’, 
I’d die laughin’.” 

“I can’t understand it,” Rodney protested. 

“Listen, Mr. Manship: I’ll let you in on a secret. Only, 
don’t you go givin’ the graft away. Bull-headed luck 
turned this trick for us. And that’s more than fifty per 
cent of good detective work—plain, or’nary luck. The 
rest’s just knowin’ how to wait and somethin’ about the 
kind of game you’re gunnin’ for. And don’t let nobody 
ever tell you dif’rent.” 


40 


BAROQUE 


Understanding that a direct question would never do, 
Rodney stooped to guile. 

“Oh! you’re too modest, Ritchey.” 

“Who, me? Don’t kid yourself. Anytime you catch 
me blushin’ly refusin’ to say it with flowers about W. K. 
Ritchey, I’ll give you a handsome present. No, on the 
level: if it hadn’t been for luck we’d still be guessin’. 
Why! for years we’ve had it figured out that more than 
half the stuff gettin’ past the Customs was handled by 
one central receivin’ and distributin’ station, but we never 
could get a line on who or where—more’n they was Eye- 
talians.” 

“Italians?” 

“Sure! Every time we’d pinch one of the little 
f ellers—you know, the peddlers—and give’m the squeeze, 
the trail’d always lead back to some Eyetalian and stop 
right there, some Wop who’d either come through with 
an armour-plate alibi or go up the River ruther’n squeal. 
They’re all like that, them Eyetalians—they never know 
nothin’ on each other.” 

“But today, I gather, one did squeal.” 

“I ain’t sayin’ who wised us up. One of the first rules 
for a good dick is, never tell on your stool-pigeon so 
long’s he gives you service. But you got to admit it was 
one hot young tip.” 

“Then it was treachery from the inside?” 

“Listen: if they was any honour among thieves, like the 
poet says—if crooks didn’t never get sore on each other 
and blow the works to get even, or get scared and think 
it’d be good business to stand in with us cops—us detec¬ 
tives could look for reg’lar work, somethin’ else that 
don’t put too much strain on the old int’lect.” 

“But what I can’t understand, Ritchey, is how that 
fine old man and his daughter—!” 

Ritchey gave a grunt of worldly wisdom. “I’ll say 
you go pretty strong on appearances, for a lawyer, Mr. 
Manship. You don’t suppose I’m talkin’ intimate’ like 


BAROQUE 


41 


this to you on the strength of your front, do you? If 
I hadn’t known you and your father before you, you’d 
have a grand time makin’ me believe you wasn’t in with 
this outfit, clean over your ears. But knowin’ you like 
I do, I know it’s just like you told me: you come here 
to draw old Aniello’s will, and that lets you out. But 
what do you know about him? Just because he’s a slick 
talker don’t prove nothin’. Just because his daughter’s 
one swell looker don’t make father out an innocent. If 
you want to know what the family’s like, take a slant at 
his brother and his son. That’s the breed with the polish 
off—you can see the grain.” 

“So you know Angelo.” 

“Not person’ly,” said the detective grimly-—“but I 
heard a lot about him. For a lad his age, he sure sets a 
mean pace.” 

Below, a hasty hand closed the front door. Rodney 
nodded, with a half smile. 

“If you’ve never met the little gentleman,” he said, 
listening to a rush of impatient feet on the stairs, “I 
fancy this is your chance.” 

Though he watched suspiciously, even his prejudiced 
vision could detect nothing artificial in the surprise that 
brought Angelo up standing when, in a state of undis¬ 
guised agitation, he broke impetuously into the room. 
Initial bewilderment and dawning consternation were 
reflected in the gaze that shifted between Rodney’s level 
and steady stare and the openly ironic regard of the 
detective. 

“What the devil!” he exclaimed; then to Rodney di¬ 
rectly : “What are you doing here ?” 

“Waiting for another look at you,” Rodney told him 
quietly—“to make sure it was you I saw on the corner 
of Fifth Avenue about three hours ago.” 

The reminder won him a black scowl. Angelo’s glance 
swung uneasily round the room and back to Ritchey. 

“Who are you?” 


42 


BAROQUE 


‘‘Detective Sergeant William K. Ritchey, of the Nar¬ 
cotic Squad, young feller.” With this an elaborate bow. 
“Compliments of Dr. Copeland, and I’m the little guy 
what pulled the raid downstairs that winds up your dope 
smugglin’ sideline.” 

“Mine!” Angelo disclaimed in sudden alarm—“I never 
had anything to do with it.” 

“Guess that settles your doubts about the whole family 
bein’ in the know, Mr. Manship.” 

“You can’t prove it—you haven’t got anything on me!” 

“No,” Ritchey admitted regretfully; “that’s gospel, I 
haven’t. But cheer up, little one! I’ll get you yet.” 

“Damn your impudence!” 

“Now! be nice—or maybe I’ll change my mind about 
not takin’ you along to be held as a material witness.” 

Half-frantic with impotent resentment, Angelo trem¬ 
bled visibly. 

“Where,” he stammered—“where’s my father?” 

Without answering, Ritchey stared gloomily at the boy 
for a moment, then looked to Rodney. 

“Guess I’ll be on my way, Mr. Manship. G’dnight.” 

He shifted the cigar to the other extreme of his mouth 
without removing his hands from his pockets, and ignor¬ 
ing Angelo, left with the easy slouch of an honest man 
who foresees an early end to a good day’s work. 

Exasperated, the boy flung over to Rodney, where he 
sat quietly observant. 

“Where’s my father? Where’s Uncle Liborio? Have 
they been arrested?” 

“Death has arrested them, Mr. Barocco.” 

“Death !” The boy reeled back as if Rodney had struck 
him, his face took on the hue of lead. “My father— 
dead!” 

“Your uncle was shot trying to escape, your father 
died of heart failure a moment later.” 

“God! I never—” 

Whatever he had meant to say, Angelo bit it off 


BAROQUE 


43 


abruptly. A hand as delicate as a girl’s moved uncertainly 
to his forehead as he stood, mouth ajar, eyes wide, star¬ 
ing at nothing. 

“You never what, Mr. Barocco?” 

Angelo collected his wits in haste. 

“I never really took much stock in it,” he faltered— 
“that stuff about twins always dying together. But now 
—when it’s happened for the third time in two genera¬ 
tions— !” 

“And that’s all your father’s death means to you.” 

“No—no, you’re wrong.” Rodney’s contempt stung 
deep; Angelo flushed hotly, bitter animosity glimmered 
in his eyes. “No: that isn’t all it means to me. Among 
other things it means I’m master here now and you— 
you’re offensive to me. Get out of my house!” 

Rodney choked back a surge of anger in his throat, 
and picked up his pen. 

“Whether or not you’re master here remains to be 
seen or, rather, to be heard, when your father’s will is 
read. Nevertheless, I’m glad to find your wish and mine 
agree. As soon as I finish this note to your sister—” 

But with that he dropped the pen again, and rose. 
Francesca stood in the doorway. In dismay, Angelo 
whirled to face her. 

A velvet house-robe of purple, little less than black, 
cloaked her with flowing folds to her feet, save that 
sweetly turned arms, bare below the elbows, gleamed like 
Parian marble against that rich background. Nor was 
there more colour in the rounded throat or the exquisitely 
chiseled face—other than violet rings beneath her eyes. 

In the gaze she bent upon her brother there was a 
question, her very silence spelled an accusation. 

Only for a moment did he try to brazen it out. Then 
even his effrontery failed, his eyes winced, his mouth 
twitched. 

“Damn it!” he cried in shrill petulance—“why d’you 
look at me like that ?” 


44 


BAROQUE 


The girl moved one pace toward him, and he started 
back in something nearly resembling panic. 

“Angelo!” she said, pausing—her voice was the very 
voice of woe—“what have you done?” 

“What do you mean, what have I done? I haven’t 
done anything, I’ve just come home from a party, I—” 

“I was waiting for you,” Francesca gently explained 
“When I heard voices here, I thought it must be you, 
and came down to find out. But it was that man, that 
detective, talking to Mr. Manship; and—well—I heard 
him say this terrible calamity tonight could never have 
happened without treachery. Angelo! somebody betrayed 
Uncle Liborio to the police. Do you know who—?” 

“No—of course not! How should I know?” 

“You know everybody who could have done it. . . . 
And, Angelo, you know your own heart.” 

Either the boy was deliberately working himself into 
a rage, or else he was going out of his mind with fear— 
cowering away from Francesca, refusing to meet her 
regard, fairly gibbering denials. 

“What’s my heart got to do with it?” He ripped out 
a string of black Italian oaths—but his voice was shaky. 
“Are you accusing me ?” 

“I say you know or can find out who did this thing. I 
say you must find out, and will—that you won’t rest till 
you do—if you are your father’s son!” 

“It’s a lie! I don’t know, and I don’t know how to 
find out. You’re crazy—out of your head! How—” 

“Angelo!” Advancing as he retreated, the girl had 
him with his back to the desk; and as he was on the 
point of darting aside, she put a detaining hand to his 
wrist. “Angelo ! are you my brother ?” 

“Let go of me!” The boy shook her off. “Stop star¬ 
ing at me like that! I won’t stand your accusing me—” 

“I don’t accuse—I ask.” 

“You let me alone, keep away!” She had caught his 
arm again and was holding on despite his resistance. 


BAROQUE 


45 


“Let go of me or—!” Of a sudden his rage seemed to 
pass into sheer madness, he faced her raving. “Damn 
you! keep off or I’ll murder you!” 

“Fm not afraid, Angelo. You value your own life too 
highly.” 

“Well! then—by God! I’ll scar you for life.” 

With a deftness approaching legerdemain his hand 
slipped into and out of a pocket. Above his head steel 
shimmered, menacing the face of his sister. Instantly 
Rodney grasped his shoulders and dragged him scream¬ 
ing, kicking and cursing, back across the desk. Inkstands 
and fittings flew, the lamp crashed to the floor, darkness 
fell, relieved by the dim light from the hallway. But 
Rodney had the knife. 

He contrived to drop it into his coat-pocket without 
losing the mastery, then for a moment held Angelo help¬ 
less with pinioned arms. 

“You rat!” he cried, and shook his victim as if he 
were in fact a rat. “If ever again you lift a hand to 
your sister, I’ll break every bone in your body!” 

He flung the boy away and, in the sudden illumination 
that followed when Francesca at the wall switched on 
the chandelier, saw Angelo land on his back with a thump 
that wrung from him a cry of pain. 

Quivering like a whipped animal, he rested briefly— 
eyes half shut, lips compressed to an ugly line, fists 
clenched, all betraying a desperate struggle to assert self- 
control. Then the fit passed and, relaxing, he picked 
himself up; but when he stood erect, with steady hands 
readjusting collar and necktie, Rodney perceived in the 
steadfast regard of eyes like black diamonds set in a 
countenance whose pallor fairly blazed, that he had suc¬ 
ceeded only in transmuting insensate anger into mortal 
hatred. 

Francesca moved between them, offering a hand of 
pardon and appeal. But her brother would not see it; 
and though he no longer hesitated to confront her, but 


46 


BAROQUE 


gave her back look for look, there was in his expression 
if anything even a deeper rancor than he had for Rodney. 

“Angelo,” she pleaded—“forgive me if I’ve hurt you— 
forget, please, if I have said anything unkind or unjust. 
Remember, I am half distracted with grief. You know 
how dear he was to me, what nobility of heart and soul 
has been taken from us tonight. Surely my sorrow is 
yours!” 

She checked on a sob. Angelo stood watching her like 
a frozen shape of malevolence. 

With a struggle she continued: 

“Angelo: alone with his poor body, an hour ago, with 
my hand on his dear dead bosom I swore an oath to find 
and expose the traitor who had brought him to his death. 
It is a sacred duty we owe to his memory, you and I.” 

Indigation quickened out of the incredulity with which 
Francesca read her brother’s response in his silence. 
Slowly her body stiffened, her shoulders straightened, 
her head lifted, till she was actually looking down at him, 
lifted above his stature by her scorn. 

“Then know this: with or without your help, against 
your opposition if it comes to that, though it take my 
lifetime, though it cost me my life, I shall keep my vow. 
And when I have found the man, whoever he may be, I 
shall denounce him—you know to whom. You know, 
too, the penalty of”—with barely perceptible hesitation 
she finished in Italian —“ ’nfamita!” 

Whatever the ulterior significance of that word, what¬ 
ever meaning attached to it in their common understand¬ 
ing beyond that which was intelligible enough to Rodney 
in the mere sound of it, that it had found the chink in 
Angelo’s armour was apparent in his flinching eyes, in 
his sharp gesture of expostulation and affright. But in¬ 
stantly he caught himself and recovered, presenting again 
to Francesca a stony mask of despite. 

“Thank Heaven that’s settled!” he sneered, and wheel¬ 
ing strode from the room. 


VIII 


‘C'VER since the death of his father had left him alone 
in the world, Rodney Manship had made his home 
in rooms near by his clubs, in the lower Fifties near Fifth 
Avenue. Here, on the second night following the raid 
on the antique shop, he entertained an unexpected caller 
in the person of Detective Sergeant Ritchey. 

“Happened to be passin’ by,” this last genially ex¬ 
plained, when he had been made comfortable with a 
cigar between his teeth and a drink at his elbow, “ ’nd 
thought I’d drop in and see if you knew anythin’.” 

“About that unfortunate affair? Not a thing—more 
than what the papers have told me, that is.” 

“Thought maybe you’d been seein’ somethin’ more of 
Miss Baroque and that prize brother of hers.” 

“No. I’m to call tomorrow to read them their father’s 
will; but I haven’t heard or seen anything of either since 
that night.” 

“Except, of course,” Ritchey corrected, “at the cem’- 
tery today.” 

“But that was only at a distance,” Rodney insisted, 
colouring slightly. “You see, their father had been an 
old client of my father’s, so I thought it only decent to 
show that much respect. But since I’m not either a 
relation or close friend, I naturally kept out of the way. 
I don’t believe Miss Baroque saw me.” 

“Maybe not,” the detective allowed; “but summonelse 
did: Friend Angelo.” 

“Think so ?” 

“Uh-huh; and registered hostility, like they say in the 
movies.” 

“I wonder!” Rodney mused. 

47 


48 


BAROQUE 


As a matter of fact, he had been wondering about that 
incident ever since. The impulse which had made him 
leave his desk and seek the cemetery at the hour ap¬ 
pointed had been, of course, more naive than the reason 
he had just alleged; and he had vaguely regretted yield¬ 
ing to it, as they so often do who are supple to impulses 
sentimental. To begin with, it had failed of its ulterior 
purpose; he had not succeeded in getting near enough 
to the grave, thanks to the throng of ostensible mourners 
characteristic of Italian funerals, to catch a fair glimpse 
of the face of fatality. He had seen Francesca only 
from a distance, she had lifted her veil only for an in¬ 
stant, toward the close of the service, when her profile 
was revealed, cameo-like in its sweet, white immobility 
against the dead background of her weeds. She was not 
weeping, her grief was too deep for that, not a shadow 
of other feeling relieved the utter sadness of her expres¬ 
sion as, with head a little bowed, she listened to the 
orotund accents of the priest and, with eyes downcast, 
watched the lowering of the twin coffins. 

With Angelo it had been otherwise. He had seemed 
to take a certain mean pride in parading callous apathy, 
had held throughout a pose of indolent impatience—a 
slight sneer twisting his lips, his gaze boldly roving. 
And once his glance had identified Rodney on the out¬ 
skirts of the crowd, or the latter was mistaken, and his 
sneer darkened. Immediately, however, he looked an¬ 
other way; and it was some time later when Rodney had 
reason to believe that Angelo had pointed him out to 
another Italian, who seemed to be staring at the Ameri¬ 
can as if bent on memorizing his features. 

But it might all have been merely imagination. . . . 
Or so Rodney had assured himself prior to his talk with 
Ritchey. 

“Didn’t know you were so devoted to duty as to attend 
funerals,” he commented, rousing from his reverie. 
“Not me, thanks. One of the other boys was there 


BAROQUE 


49 


to get an eye-full of the crowd and see if maybe any of 
’em looked like he needed watchinV , 

“Did your colleague pick up anything helpful?” 

“Maybe so,” Mr. Ritchey liberally admitted—“maybe 
not.” 

Rodney grinned appreciatively. “I gather you didn’t 
get much out of Angelo.” 

That one, he knew, had spent several unhappy hours 
at Police Headquarters on the morning following the 
raid. 

“It would ’ve surprised you,” the detective admitted, 
“what a hell of a lot Angelo didn’t know. Of course 
he knew what ’d been goin’ on in the shop, and didn’t 
pretend he didn’t; but he stuck to it he never had no 
hand in the business. And if you ask me, I’ll say he 
told the truth there—for once in his young life.” 

“What makes you think that?” 

Instead of answering the detective got up quickly and 
strode over to Rodney’s desk. 

“What’s this?” he demanded, examining the knife 
which Rodney had taken from Angelo. “What you doin’ 
with a settesoldi?” 

“A what ?” 

“Settesoldi—Eyetalian for this kind of dagger.” 

“What a lot you know, Ritchey.” 

“Lis’n: Joe Petrosino. . . . Remember the Wop de¬ 
tective that used to play horse with the Black Handers 
till they murdered him over in Italy ten—twelve years 
ago ? Say! that was one reg’lar guy. Him and me used 
to be side-kicks. I got a lot of info off him about the 
way them Wops works.” Ritchey balanced the long, thin 
blade on his palm. “Where’d you pick this up, Mr. 
M'anship ?” 

Rodney explained, and Ritchey’s look grew more 
serious. 

“That’s a bad actor, that boy,” he commented. “I’d 
give a lot if we’d been able to hitch him up with the 


50 


BAROQUE 


dope smugglin’ trade, and ship him back to the reserva¬ 
tion. He ain’t safe s’long’s he’s loose; I tell you straight, 
if I was you and Mister Angelo had as much cause to 
pack a mad on me, I’d walk a heap o’ blocks to keep 
out of his way.” 

“You’re joking, Ritchey.” 

“Like hell ... I don’t feel like jokin’ tonight, and I 
got a good right not to.” 

Rodney asked why. 

“Well!” the detective grimly replied: “I just come 
from seein’ Norton.” 

“The man who shot Liborio? What did he have to 
say? Is he still afraid of trouble because he was so 
quick on the trigger?” 

“He didn’t have nothin’ to say, and he ain’t afraid of 
no trouble of any sort—now. He’s croaked.” 

“Dead!” . 

“Pumped full of lead three doors from his house by 
a taxicab-full of Wop gunmen, just after dark this eve¬ 
nin’. He’d just got a couple weeks’ leave and was goin’ 
out o’ town to lay low for a while. Leaves a wife and 
two kids. The taxi got away clean—nobody even lamped 
its number. That’s what he got for shootin’ up a prom’- 
nent Eyetalian citizen, uncle of little playmate Angelo. 
Now do you get me?—understand why I say you’d better 
keep out of Angelo’s way as much as you can and try 
and not get his goat if you do run into him ? Oh, I don’t 
say he’d go so far’s to give you what Norton got; but 
gettin’ beat up ain’t no fun neither, and maybe spendin’ 
the rest of your life in a wheel-chair. Take my advice, 
and don’t go walkin’ alone at night, and don’t go ridin’ 
in no taxis you don’t know where they come from. Say, 
lis’n: ever been to Palm Beach ? Whyn’t you run down 
there for a spell?” 


IX 


T>UT if Ritchey had any real hope that Rodney would 
heed his warning, his professional lifetime had 
taught him singularly little about human nature. 

Rodney was neither more nor less confident of his 
ability to take care of himself than the next man of his 
age and mettle; but his was the normal idiosyncrasy of 
the Anglo-Saxon, who is never quite able to believe that 
the Latin really means it when he gives a melodramatic 
gesture. The tradition of Anglo-Saxon phlegm is re¬ 
sponsible for a great deal of nonsense in our minds, but 
for nothing more stupid than our cultivated indisposition 
to take what we term melodrama seriously; whereas the 
most superficial student of humanity knows that the 
average man is instinctively “melodramatic” the moment 
he forgets to be self-conscious. 

Required to sum up his impressions of Angelo at that 
stage of their acquaintance, Rodney would probably have 
employed the phrase “an unlicked cub”; not that he 
believed a good licking would exorcize the spirit of mal¬ 
evolence in the boy, but that it ought to teach him a 
sorely needed lesson, to wit, that there were limits to 
the patience of Society with youngsters who barged about 
flourishing knives and pistols and murderous black looks 
and playing the giddy goat is general. 

Furthermore, Rodney could find nothing definite to 
support Ritchey’s assumption that Norton had been shot 
down by Italian gunmen bent on avenging the death of 
Liborio Baroque. No eyewitnesses had come forward 
to testify that the occupants of the taxicab were Italians. 
They might very well have been nondescript criminals, 
taking advantage of a chance recounter to pay off old 

51 


52 


BAROQUE 


scores. Norton was reputed to have been a tolerably 
busy Nemesis to wrong-doers in general, without dis¬ 
crimination in respect of nationality. Many other than 
Italians had been given ample reason to desire his death. 
That it had overtaken him in violent form so soon after 
the Baroque affair might very well have been a simple 
coincidence. 

Thus it was without serious misgivings that Rodney 
called at the Barocco home at noon of the day after the 
funeral. 

The manservant who showed him up to the library 
left him alone there while he summoned “the signor and 
signorina.” 

A heart that knew her footfalls on the staircase as 
soon as they became audible was out of all control by 
the time Francesca entered the room. His gaze dwelt 
hungrily upon her face, and found it fairer even than 
his memories had portrayed it, fairer for the very sign 
of her sorrow that it wore. Pathetically grave and 
sweet, slender and graceful in her deep mourning, she 
came directly to him and put her hand in his. 

“My dear friend,” she said simply: “I hurried down 
to see you—to thank you. It was like you to be—there 
—yesterday.” 

She had seen him, after all! 

“I couldn’t keep away,” he said, apologetic. “It seemed 
the only way to show my respect and sympathy. . . . 
You had called on me for nothing . . .1 thought you 
wouldn’t mind.” 

“It was like you,” she repeated. “To see you—helped 
—a little.” 

It was not a time when a woman of sensibility would 
stoop to trifling. Neither was Francesca conceivably one 
who could be unaware of the inference implicit to any 
man of intelligence in so open an avowal of regard. 
Nevertheless, there was this to be remembered, that she 
was speaking under stress of emotion that might well 


BAROQUE 


53 


have warped her sense of proportion and had, moreover, 
nothing at all to do with romantic love. 

“I am glad,” Rodney replied with restraint. “I only 
wish I might have been really helpful, some way. You 
haven’t any idea how I’ve hated to think of your being 
left alone here—nobody but servants—!” 

“It was best for me . . .” 

“I know. Still, I’d have felt more at ease in mind if 
I could have been sure you would remember me in event 
of trouble.” 

“You mean, in event of Angelo,” the girl interpreted. 
“But I’ve had no trouble with him. He was good—or 
selfish—enough to keep out of my way—except yester¬ 
day, of course. If I didn’t know him better, I should 
be grateful to him for being so thoughtful. Unhappily, 
I do.” 

“Perhaps you have the police to thank for your im¬ 
munity,” Rodney suggested. “I mean—I presume you 
know—they invited your brother down to Headquarters, 
the other morning, to be questioned.” Then catching 
the flash of startled enquiry in her eyes before her lips 
could frame negative or query, he continued hastily: 
“But I understand they got nothing out of him—if he 
knew anything.” 

He fancied a fugitive gleam of challenge in her look. 
If so, she was quickly satisfied that Rodney was not 
seeking to disguise the truth, for the sake of her peace 
of mind. 

“Angelo knows enough,” she said in subdued bitter¬ 
ness—“too much—far more than I. But of course he 
would never tell.” 

“You don’t mean me to understand that he—?” 

“No: he had nothing to do with the smuggling. 
Though that wasn’t his fault, but simply because he 
couldn’t get on with my uncle. It seems odd, I know, 
that the two ‘baroques’ of the family should have been 
so completely unsympathetic; but it’s true. They were 


54 


BAROQUE 


always quarreling, Uncle Liborio and Angela; and 
strangely enough, my uncle was as much opposed as my 
father to Angelo’s”—she hesitated and finished lamely 
—“doing what he did to make father disinherit him.” 

“You mean,” Rodney prompted before he thought, 
“when he became a ‘novice’ and ‘took the vows’ ?” 

Her dismay was unconcealed. “What do you mean?” 
she demanded in a breath. “Mr. Manship! what do 
you know?” 

“Nothing, believe me, Miss Barocco. Only I happened 
to recall your father’s words, that night when we first 
met. You remember, when you told him you’d found 
Angelo out in some mischief you didn’t name—?” 

A swift search of his countenance soothed her alarms. 
She had a hinted shrug of relief. 

“I had forgotten—or hoped you had.” 

“If that is your wish—I have.” 

“Thank you, my friend.” With a look wistful and 
deprecating she let her hand rest in Rodney’s for a 
moment. “You know,” she went on, with the wan 
shadow of a smile, “you have succeeded in making me 
quite confident of you, somehow.” 

“You may be,” Rodney assured her earnestly, “with¬ 
out fear of any disappointment. I can think of nothing 
I wouldn’t do rather than forfeit your faith—since you 
tell me I am fortunate enough to have won it.” 

“I am sure of that. And yet. . . .” She faltered be¬ 
tween impulse and constraint. “Oh!” she cried mutin¬ 
ously—“I wish I might be frank with you, tell you 
everything, ask your advice.” 

“Why not?” he urged gently. “Communications be¬ 
tween lawyer and client are privileged, you know.” 

Long lashes veiled her eyes, she shook her head, drew 
away her hand. 

“No: I can’t explain, it’s impossible.” 

“At present, no doubt: you are the best judge of that. 
But perhaps another day—?” 


BAROQUE 


55 


“No, never! Please believe me, Mr. Manship—I ap¬ 
preciate your kindness and want to make you understand^ 
but can’t because—there are the gravest reasons. . . . 
Only one thing I must tell you: about father—I can’t let 
you go on thinking he had anything to do with that drug 
smuggling.’’ 

Rodney interposed, “I never did,” but she did not heed. 

“That was Uncle Liborio’s affair alone. Father knew, 
of course, and disapproved, would have done anything 
to put a stop to it; but my uncle would never listen to 
him, and father was powerless, he could do nothing, his 
hands were bound.” 

“I never for an instant doubted that. I don’t believe 
it was possible for anybody to know your father, even 
as little as I knew him, and doubt his essential honesty.” 

Rodney had spoken without calculation, but the craf¬ 
tiest of lovers could not more shrewdly have prospered 
his suit. Gratitude was lambent in the eyes of the girl, 
behind a veil of unshed tears; the woeful line of her lips 
softened, they were tremulous with the fluttering syllables 
of her response. 

“Oh, thank you—thank you for that!” 

In that instant, in that humour, she was his. He knew 
it, but no better than she. And a little silence lengthened 
between them, while they stood astare, contemplating 
incredulously that bright revelation which had been 
granted unto them, shaken by the drumming of their 
pulses, each breathlessly aware that Rodney had only to 
open his arms. . . . 

But there were voices in the hallway, footsteps, rust¬ 
ling petticoats. 

Francesca started slightly, drew back, and found a 
chair to one side of the desk as the servants entered— 
her old nurse, the cook, the housekeeper, the manservant 
—all Italians of the peasant class, in makeshift mourning, 
wearing faces of solemnity that were not altogether 


56 


BAROQUE 


successful in dissembling the keen curiosity and cupidity 
that informed them every one. 

Quaint courtesies were accorded Rodney as custodian 
of the instrument through which they were presently to 
profit. He gave formal bows in return. The servants 
settled into chairs ranged stiffly against the wall farthest 
from the window. Then Angelo came in, with a high 
head and a fleering mouth, defiance in his very stride. 
With him he introduced a new equation, a gentleman 
whom Rodney had not seen before. 

A man of medium inches, with a tendency toward 
stoutness, florid of person, this one wore chequered trou¬ 
sers with a grey morning coat whose black braiding was 
as broad as a jest in bad taste; a grey ascot transfixed 
by a large pearl, a white linen waistcoat and spats, and 
the shiniest of patent leather shoes, completed the efful¬ 
gent ensemble. And as he stopped and bowed cere¬ 
moniously to Rodney, white teeth flashed in an olive- 
tinted, boldly featured face of Italian cast. 

“Mr. Manship, I believe ?” Rodney found himself 
shaking a plump and highly manicured hand that boasted 
a notable growth of silky black hairs on its back, and 
on its fingers two massive gold rings, set with a seal and 
a huge solitaire diamond. “I am Mr. Leo Croce—attor¬ 
ney for Mr. Angelo Baroque.” 

“Oh!” said Rodney—“indeed?” 

Perfunctory and colourless, the exclamation dissem¬ 
bled astonishment and misgivings. Why had Angelo 
thought it necessary to bring counsel to the reading of 
his father’s will? Was he meaning to contest it, then? 
If so, on what grounds? 

Rodney looked to Francesca for enlightenment, but 
gathered nothing from the composure with which she 
was suffering the addresses of Mr. Croce, with whom 
she seemed to be on terms of indifferent acquaintance. 

Ignoring Rodney and his sister, Angelo had thrown 
himself into a chair to the right of the desk. Mr. Croce 


BAROQUE 


57 


retreated to a seat beside his client, and hiked up the 
knees of his trousers till an inch or so of lurid sock 
burned above either spat; after which a genial flash of 
teeth signified that, so far as he was personally con¬ 
cerned, there was no need for more delay. 

Again Rodney silently consulted Francesca. She gave 
a slight inclination of the head. He sat down, took the 
will from his brief-case, and began to read. 

An attentive hush was disturbed only by subdued 
rustlings on the part of the minor legatees, till Rodney 
finished, placed the will on the desk before him, and 
looked round the ring of faces. 

Francesca was sitting with head bowed and downcast 
gaze fixed upon slim, white, motionless fingers inter¬ 
laced in her lap. The servants were stirring, gesticu¬ 
lating, exchanging hoarse whispers of congratulation. 
Angelo, with his feet sprawling, his hands in his pockets, 
and his head thrown back, was staring at a corner of the 
ceiling, a sneer disfiguring his handsome features. Mr. 
Croce, however, was on the alert for Rodney’s eye, and 
favoured him with another flash of teeth. 

“If you do not mind, Mr. Manship,” he suggested 
silkily—“the date of that document again?” 

Rodney repeated it. 

“Ah, yes! I was not mistaken, then. I thought it 
could not possibly postdate the will in our possession.” 

“The will in your possession!” 

“Just so,” purred Mr. Croce, producing a folded paper 
with a legal backing. “Executed in my office only a few 
hours before his lamentable demise, this, I am confident, 
will be found to be the last will and testament of Mr. 
Aniello Barocco, or Baroque, deceased.” 

“I beg your pardon!” Rodney sat forward sharply. 
“Are you sure?” 

This time Mr. Croce showed his teeth less engagingly. 

“I hope I misunderstand you, Mr. Manship. I should 
be sorry to think you were disputing my good faith.” 


58 


BAROQUE 


Francesca had lifted her head and was watching An¬ 
gelo with a face inscrutable. Rodney’s eyes hardened 
and his mouth as well. 

“I shall be better instructed as to my answer, Mr. 
Croce,” he crisply returned, “when we have heard you 
read this second will.” 

“Perhaps you will be good enough to read it to us, 
Mr. Manship.” The Italian rose and with a graceful 
bow of mockery thinly masked presented the document. 
“You will find it differs from what you have just read 
in one material respect only,” he added, resuming his 
seat. “The minor bequests are identical; but my client, 
not his sister, is made the chief beneficiary. Look it 
over, Mr. Manship—satisfy yourself.” 

Rodney snapped the paper open, then turned to Fran¬ 
cesca. 

“What do you say? Shall I read it aloud, Miss 
Barocco ?” 

“Not unless you think it worth while,” the girl returned 
in cool accents, without looking away from her brother. 
“I don’t think it should be necessary, I have no doubt 
you’ll find it is precisely as Mr. Croce says.” 

Rodney hesitated, then with a shrug turned his atten¬ 
tion to the paper. But his face grew red and his gorge 
rose with resentment of the effrontery of the thing: an 
impudent paraphrase of the very will which he had com¬ 
posed and of which a copy had been stolen from his 
office, with only sufficient rewording here and there to 
lend it a colourful semblance of original composition, 
and in every instance with the name of Angelo appearing 
where Francesca’s had appeared and vice versa. 

All but trembling with indignation, he looked up at 
length; but. a glimpse of polite teeth, as Mr. Croce smil¬ 
ingly waited upon his verdict, served as cold water to 
the hot metal of his anger; and it was with voice and 
hand steady enough that he rose and approached Fran¬ 
cesca. 


BAROQUE 


59 


“Mr. Croce’s statements are quite in order,” he an¬ 
nounced, “as to the tenor of this—ah—writing. But if 
you will examine the signature, Miss Barocco, and tell 
me whether or not you believe it to be genuine—” 

“Sir!”—Mr. Croce jumped up as if suddenly stung— 
“are you aware of the nature of that innuendo?” 

Rodney met his glare with calm eyes of contempt. 

“I am,” he replied, and showed the man his shoulder, 
attentive to Francesca alone. 

It seemed to him she needed an inordinately long time 
to make up her mind. Once she looked up with illegible 
eyes and for several seconds studied the face of her 
brother. Rodney paid that one no attention, but was 
sensitive to an intuitive impression that something was 
going on outside the bounds of his perception, something 
secret was being communicated between brother and sis¬ 
ter, with no word spoken and, so far as he could tell, no 
sign given. Then again Francesca bowed her head above 
the will, and after a little folded it, rose, and gave it 
back to Rodney. 

“The signature is good,” she said quietly. 

Mr. Croce interjected an “Ah!” of great gratification. 

But Rodney was satisfied that the girl had lied. 

It wasn’t, however, his part to dispute her. If she 
were content to let herself be cheated out of a goodly 
fortune and see her father’s wishes set at nought by a 
trick of brazen fraudulence, one could do nothing but 
bow to her decision. 

He did bow slightly in token of his deference to her 
will, then turning restored the paper to the ready hand 
of Mr. Croce. 

“Thank you very much,” said that gentleman with, of 
course, a dental flash. “I quite understand, Mr. Manship, 
and respect your anxiety to protect the interests of a 
client. I am willing to admit it was a natural question 
you raised just now, natural under the circumstance, 


60 BAROQUE 

even though it impugned the honour of my client and 
myself.” 

“I am sorry, Mr. Croce,” said Rodney. “But really 
—don’t you think ?—it would be as well to save up your 
generosity for the time when I am ready to apologize.” 

The Italian stiffened and drew back with a dark coun¬ 
tenance relieved by no glittering teeth; but Angelo 
started up in a rage and shouldered between the two. 

“That’ll be all from you!” he snarled in Rodney’s face. 
“Now—I guess you know who’s master here, at last! 
And what I’ve got to say to you is just this—once and 
for all time—get out! And don’t show your face here 
again unless you’re ready to take the consequences.” 

Deliberately Rodney turned his back to Angelo. “I’m 
sorry, Miss Barocco,” he said. “I would have been glad 
had I been able to serve you to more purpose. As it is, 
I’m sure you know you have only to call on me at any 
time.” He offered a hand. “Good afternoon.” 

“Not yet, Mr. Manship,” said Francesca. “If you 
don’t mind, I’m going with you. As Angelo says, he is 
now master here; and since that is so, my place is else¬ 
where. If you’ll be kind enough to give me a lift in 
your taxi and drop me at a hotel, I’ll send back for my 
things.” 


X 


/~\PPOSITION on the part of Angelo blazed up in- 
stantaneously, and—when it dawned on him that 
Francesca actually meant to make good her promise— 
ranged the emotional gamut from plaintive prayers and 
expostulation to impassioned argument, denunciation, 
even threats. Or so one surmised whose only clues were 
in the swiftly changing nuances of his torrential Italian, 
his facial play and incessantly weaving hands of illustra¬ 
tion. 

And if it seemed surprising, this sudden show of con¬ 
sternation at the prospect of immediate and final sever¬ 
ance of relations with the sister whom he had given so 
much cause to fear and shun him, one had only to recall 
what the father had said concerning the peculiar psychic 
bond between the twins, by virtue of which (and in the 
case of Angelo especially) neither could be happy or at 
ease if denied the society of the other for any con¬ 
siderable time. 

But he raged and raved, prayed and protested all in 
vain. And in vain did Mr. Leo Croce seek to soothe 
the troubled domestic waters with the unctuous oils of 
eloquence and diplomatic persuasiveness. As vain were 
the lamentations of the servants, voiced with the freedom 
of old friends, when they saw themselves threatened 
with the loss of the one remaining member of the house¬ 
hold who held any true title to their respect and affection. 

Go Francesca would, and that without a minute of 
avoidable delay; and go she did in spite of every effort 
to dissuade her. 

In Rodney’s sight there was something at once amus¬ 
ing and admirable in the way the girl, coolly ignoring 

61 


62 


BAROQUE 


the storm of which she was the focal point, made her 
arrangements. The manservant she told off to fetch a 
taxicab, her old nurse she instructed to stay behind, pack 
up such belongings as she would need overnight, and 
bring them on to the hotel. The housekeeper would 
attend to packing and forwarding the remainder. 

Then, telling Rodney that she would be grateful if he 
would wait at the door while she donned her wraps, 
Francesca brushed past the still furiously (protesting 
Angelo and his attorney as if unaware of their existence, 
with unimpaired dignity left the library and went up¬ 
stairs to her room. 

The servants followed; and after a moment of agon¬ 
ized indecision, Angelo flung out in pursuit of his sister. 

Picking up his brief-case, Rodney likewise made for 
the door, but pulled up at the earnest instance of Mr. 
Croce. 

“A moment, if you please, Mr. Manship—one little 
minute.” 

“Well?” 

The Italian gave a deprecating gesture with a placating 
display of teeth. 

“This is all so unfortunate! These unhappy children, 
quarreling in the very shadow of their father’s death! 
But you have great influence with Miss Barocco—one 
sees that, Mir. Manship—and I, perhaps, a little with my 
client. Let us forget our differences, you and I, and try 
to patch up this deplorable misunderstanding.” 

“Why?” 

“But surely! what worthier motive could we ask than 
the hope of reuniting brother and sister at such a time 1” 

“Mr. Croce,” Rodney advised: “if we’re to get any¬ 
where, you’ll have to quit talking rot. I’m willing to 
co-operate with you, if you can make me see any possible 
profit to my client in a reconciliation with this bad egg 
of a brother of hers. But I warn you frankly, you’ll 
have to be plausible to overcome my prejudices.” 


BAROQUE 


63 


“My dear sir!” 

“If you ask me, your client is about as thorough-paced 
a young rotter as I want ever to meet. If I were his 
sister, I’d see him sizzle in hellfire before I’d forgive him 
his outrageous performance of this afternoon—this pro¬ 
duction of an alleged will which you know as well as I 
was executed under duress of some sort—if it’s anything 
better than a downright forgery!” 

A livid flush darkened the face of the Italian. 

“Take care, Mr. Manship!” 

“I’m measuring my words, Mr. Croce, and I’ll answer 
to you for every one of them you’ve got the cheek to 
challenge, before the Bar Association or elsewhere, at 
your pleasure. As for your client, you may tell him 
with my compliments that, any time he feels called upon 
to cut up nasty, I ask nothing better than a fair excuse 
to put him where he belongs—behind the bars!” 

To Rodney’s immense disappointment, Mr. Croce got 
the better of the symptoms of apoplexy which had seemed 
to promise incontinently to carry him off, and proved 
himself master of his temper as well, executing a very 
creditable bow and replying in a voice of all but imper¬ 
ceptible tremor: 

“I shall not fail to deliver your message, sir. As for 
myself, you shall hear from me without delay.” 

Not to be outdone, Rodney bowed in turn, and marched 
out and down to the entrance-hall. 

He had not long to wait. The manservant had barely 
succeeded in finding a taxicab when Francesca appeared, 
hatted, furred, and unattended. Rodney had anticipated 
at the best one last scene with Angelo; but whether that 
one had given it up in despair or Francesca had con¬ 
trived to slip away while his back was turned, she came 
alone; and Rodney was able to conduct her to the cab 
without another clash. 

“The Chatham, please,” she said, and when Rodney 
had repeated the address to the driver and taken his seat 


64 


BAROQUE 


beside her, added the explanation: “I have a dear friend 
living there, Madame Farusi, the singer.” 

“I’ve never heard her. Sings in concert mostly, doesn’t 
she ?” 

“Yes. She is delightful, and with her I shan’t be too 
lonely.” 

“I am glad,” Rodney said, sincerely relieved. 

It was only a few minutes’ ride, and rather a silent 
one; for Rodney, understanding what troubled deeps of 
feeling lay beneath Francesca’s surface calm and what 
the latter must cost her to maintain, was studious to say 
nothing to disturb it. 

He had his reward in the look and tone with which she 
thanked him, on arriving at the Chatham, and gave him 
leave to call her up in the evening and enquire if there 
were anything more that he could do. And then he went 
back to his office and did his best to make amends for 
his neglect of the affairs of other clients, but all too often 
found the face of fatality, a vivid vision of richly tinted 
loveliness, burning through the cold black-and-white text 
to which he was endeavouring to fix his attention. 

When he telephoned after dinner, Francesca assured 
him that it went well enough with her, everything con¬ 
sidered. And she was in better spirits than he had hoped, 
or her voice deceived him. She had been fortunate 
enough to secure rooms adjoining the apartment of 
Madame Farusi; Marcella, her nurse, had duly turned 
up with the first installment of her personal belongings 
and had announced her settled determination never to 
leave one whom she had served since childhood; and, 
finally, Madame Farusi had been most kind and, on 
learning that Francesca wanted an early conference with 
her legal adviser, had suggested that it might be agree¬ 
able if Mr. Manship would consent to dine with them 
the following night. 

So Rodney hung up in a tolerably contented frame of 
mind, telling himself that the dull life of a lawyer in 


BAROQUE 


65 


general practice had after all its compensations; since 
such happiness as he had in prospect would have been 
out of the question, in view of the convenances, had he 
not been, at least to the world, first of all the attorney 
in his relation to Francesca Barocco. 

And when he turned in, a still more exhilarating re¬ 
flection banished all thought of sleep at the very moment 
when its weight was most leaden upon his senses. 

Whether or not the second will of Aniello Barocco 
were ever to be proved the instrument of fraud he firmly 
believed it to be, nothing could change the fact that it 
had placed Francesca in a position to be courted by a 
man in the moderate if adequate circumstances of Rod¬ 
ney Manship without risk of his being rated a fortune 
hunter. 

And so eventually he dozed off, quite satisfied that, 
when all was said and done, he really owed Angelo a 
vast debt of gratitude for being a damned scoundrel. . . . 

Madame Farusi proved to be one of those handsome, 
amiable and accomplished women of the world, abundant 
of person, and an apparently inexhaustible reservoir of 
vitality, who are so often the possessors of extraordinary 
voices. Perhaps predisposed in his favour, she seemed 
to take a liking to Rodney at sight, and although she 
would eat little or nothing, since she was to sing that 
night, with rare tact and good nature succeeded in making 
the excellent dinner she had ordered a more cheerful 
one than it had seemed reasonable to hope it would 
be. 

It was barely ended when she was obliged to leave her 
guests; and Rodney came back from closing the living- 
room door behind the lady to find Francesca standing at 
one of the windows, pensively gazing down at the pros¬ 
pect of Park Avenue by night, studded with fixed lights 
like incandescent pearls and haunted by scampering files 
of motor cars that, with their dim lamps, made one think 
of great, ungainly fireflies doomed by fatal sorcery to 


66 BAROQUE 

pursue one another upon those unvarying rounds through 
all eternity. 

‘‘My New York!” the girl murmured softly. ‘Tve 
always loved it so, I can hardly bear the thought of 
leaving it.” 

Something disagreeable happened to the orderly rou¬ 
tine of Rodney’s heart action; and he wondered dully if 
his voice had as queer a sound in her hearing as in his. 

“Are you thinking of that? Must you?” 

“I don’t know, I’m not sure. It’s one of the things I 
want you to help me decide.” Francesca left the window 
and found a chair, motioning to Rodney to take one 
nearby. “Everything has changed so suddenly, I’m just 
beginning to realize I’ve got to decide what to do with 
my life. Nella Farusi wants me to go to England with 
her when she finishes her concert engagements here— 
that’s next week—and it might be the wisest thing.” 

“Oh, I hope not!” 

The exclamation of desperate sincerity won a glimpse 
of her shadowy smile. 

“But I haven’t much money now, you know, Mr. 
Manship; and money goes farther over there. And then 
I have a little property inherited from my mother, a 
house in London that I could live in and so save rent. 
My mother’s people live near London, and they’re most 
charming and seem very fond of me; so I wouldn’t be 
quite friendless. You see, there’s every reason why I 
ought to go but—I don’t want to.” 

“Heaven knows I don’t want you to! If I had my 
way, you’d stay here and fight that will to a finish.” 

She shook her head slowly. “No; I couldn’t do that.” 

“You mean you won’t. But you’re wrong to coun¬ 
tenance such a barefaced swindle.” 

“You really believe it’s a swindle?” 

“No one will ever be able to make me believe it isn’t— 
that your father could change his mind so radically in 
such a short time and without any provocation. First 


BAROQUE 67 

111 have to believe your brother isn’t a scamp and his 
lawyer a shyster.” 

“I understand,” Francesca affirmed gently—“how very 
strange it must seem to you.” 

“Well! doesn’t it to you.” 

“Yes, in a way—but perhaps no. You see, I know 
father was mysteriously called away from home that 
afternoon, but not where he went; I don’t know that he 
wasn’t in MV. Croce’s office and that pressure wasn’t 
brought to bear on him there to induce him to dictate a 
new will.” 

“What sort of pressure ?” 

“That’s a question I daren’t answer—at present. I 
can’t be sure I’m justified in my suspicions. When I am 
sure—and some day I shall be—you shall know all about 
it, Mr. Manship.” 

“It isn’t likely you’ll ever find out the truth,” Rodney 
doubted gloomily. 

“You think not?” 

“Not if you refuse to contest that will. It’s fighting 
that brings rascals out into the open—not letting them 
have everything their own way.” 

“But I haven’t given up the idea of fighting—only I 
must fight in my own fashion, with my own weapons. 
And I haven’t begun to fight yet, I’m merely planning 
my campaign.” 

“But if you let them probate this alleged will—1” 

“You forget it may be genuine; and to lose would be 
worse than not fighting at all. And then, to me, the will 
is a minor point, and by not contesting it I may lull the 
enemy into a false sense of security—give the impression 
that I’m afraid. But I’m not, Mr. Manship. It wasn’t 
the empty threat of a hysterical woman, the warning I 
gave Angelo that night. I shall be true to the promise 
I made my dead father, to find and bring to punishment 
those whose treachery brought about his death—though 
it take my lifetime!” 


68 


BAROQUE 


Rodney got up and began to pace the room, frowning. 

“I wish you hadn’t reminded me,” he said. “I hoped 
—believed—you had forgotten.” 

“Never.” 

“But it’s madness! You, a girl, a mere child, to set 
yourself against such desperate criminals as must make 
up that smuggling ring!” 

“I’m not afraid.” 

“I know you’re not. That’s what frightens me, pre¬ 
cisely what is going to make it such a dangerous business 
for you.” 

“I shall succeed,” the girl stated with quiet confidence, 
“and without coming to harm. The right is on my side.” 

“If the right always prevailed, there’d never be any 
wrong-doing in this world. Oh! I wish I knew how to 
persuade you.” 

“You can’t, Mr. Manship—no one can. You mustn’t 
forget I am half Italian. You only waste strength when 
you try to reason against racial instinct and traditions— 
just as I’d be wasting mine if I tried to deny my nature. 
You can help me most by not opposing me.” 

“God knows I’ll help you all I can, in any way you 
will!” Rodney groaned. Then he stopped short beside 
her chair and stood staring down at her in patent puz¬ 
zlement. “But you’re going to England!” 

“Yes.” 

He drew a deep breath and his brows cleared. “Then 
that’s all right! You can’t run into much danger over 
there ’’ 

“No,” she agreed inscrutably; “that is true.” 

“For the first time I’m glad. A while ago, when you 
suggested it, I thought there was nothing I wouldn’t do, 
almost, to prevent your going. But now—!” 

“You didn’t think it wise? But why?” 

“It wasn’t that, it was because I—” He caught himself 
up, and shook a fretful head. “I hadn’t meant to say 
anything—this is hardly the time—but I think you un- 


BAROQUE 69 

derstand what it will mean to me, to have you go 
away.” 

With a broken smile the girl lifted a hand to him; and 
Rodney caught it in both his own. 

“As you say, this is not the time. But, dear friend, 
I do understand . . 

Gently disengaging her hand, Francesca rose, moved 
over to an escritoire, and took up a small packet of papers 
that lay there. 

“And now,” she said in a voice that tried to be matter- 
of-fact, “if you don’t mind looking these over and telling 
me just what I must do to leave everything in your hands 
while I’m away . . 


XI 


'T'EN days from that day the Aquitania sailed, leaving 
-■* a forlorn Rodney Manship to task all his fortitude 
of soul with the necessity of carrying on in a world that 
had of a sudden become a waste of desolating futility; 
while in her stateroom the girl Francesca sat with dream¬ 
ing eyes, lonely and wistful amid his roses . . . 

Yet never a word of love had breathed between those 
two, nor any pledge been asked or proffered—perhaps 
because none was needed. Their understanding must 
have been complete if tacit, at that time, at all events in 
so far as it had to do with Rodney Manship, his heart 
and mind, whose secret his eyes, his accents, the simple 
devotion of his attitude, had a hundred times betrayed. 

As for Francesca, from first to last beyond all telling 
gracious, sweet and kind, in the end she remained to 
him what in the beginning she had been, an enigma as 
inscrutable as exquisite—it may be to herself as well, 
in the fullness of her preoccupation with that remote 
and fatal destiny to which she stood self-dedicated. 

A test more trying could hardly have been devised. 
But if Rodney found in work anodyne of a sort for the 
ache of longing, his heart held constant, he turned from 
his times of toil to dreams of Francesca as surely and 
eagerly as a man parched from labour in the fields turns 
to a rill of running water. 

He was, moreover, fortunate in this, that his clientele 
as a body was litigiously disposed that winter, or had 
quarrels forced upon it, or blundered into troubles 
through sheer stupidity, and so kept him uncommonly 
busy six days out of seven. And if this pressure of 
affairs did keep him out of the open air too much, he 

70 


BAROQUE 


71 


reckoned it his salvation, mainly responsible for his 
failure to commit some act of hopeless asininity—such 
as hopping aboard the first available steamer for England 
and making such an unmitigated nuisance of himself over 
there that simple weariness of spirit would prompt Fran¬ 
cesca to send him packing with a flat and final “No!” 

So he schooled himself to be content with the few 
notes that came to him from over the water—notes never 
lengthy, but always breathing the friendliest spirit, and 
as a rule compact with news, telling him that Francesca 
was charmed with her house in London and had settled 
down in it to spend the winter, with Madame Farusi as 
her guest; that she had been hospitably entreated by her 
mother’s relatives; that her health continued to be ex¬ 
cellent; and (he read between the lines) that the pain 
of the wound dealt by the loss of her father was growing 
less acute, she was learning by degrees to deal with life 
less on the old rebellious terms than on those of a philos¬ 
ophy generously maturing. 

But never a hint of a wish to return, never an enquiry 
after her brother. . . . 

Had it been otherwise, Rodney would have had nothing 
to report. For all the forebodings voiced by Ritchey, 
Angelo apparently had lost interest in Rodney from the 
moment when the latter left the Barocco residence for 
the last time, in company with Francesca. Since then 
Rodney had neither seen anything of the boy nor heard 
from him except indirectly, and this but once. 

Unavoidably he had been thrown into some associa¬ 
tion with Mr. Leo Croce, when the will of Aniello 
Barocco was probated and the trust fund established to 
pay Francesca the annuity which should rightly have 
been Angelo’s only souvenir of his father. But Mr. 
Croce was seemingly disposed to let bygones be bygones, 
never raked up Rodney’s challenge of his probity, and 
was to all appearances cheerfully unaware of, at worst 
quite unaffected by, that coolness which on Rodney’s part 


72 


BAROQUE 


characterized their relations. An uninstructed observer, 
indeed, might well have gathered that they were on the 
best of terms and counted Rodney’s stiffness a lamentable 
defect of temperament, and a poor return for the urban¬ 
ity of the other. 

Notwithstanding, Mr. Croce failed to worm out of 
Rodney the secret of Francesca’s whereabouts, his most 
ingenious essays being rewarded only with the advice 
that Rodney would be pleased to forward letters ad¬ 
dressed in his care. 

It was toward the middle of March when Mr. Croce 
did Rodney the honour of paying him a surprise call in 
his office. 

“Don’t ask you to be glad to see me,” he volunteered 
with a vivid exhibition of teeth—“but I believe you’ll 
overlook the intrusion, Mr. Manship, when you under¬ 
stand the friendly feeling that brings me.” 

“Indeed?” Rodney replied, but remained standing by 
his desk. 

Unabashed, Mr. Croce helped himself to a chair, deftly 
adjusted the knees of his trousers to conserve their ad¬ 
mirable creasing, and relighted a cigar that had been 
better dead. 

“Yes, indeed,” he amiably rejoined, between puffs. 
“Between you and me and the lamp-post, it isn’t always 
easy to hold my client when somebody gets the wind up 
him. He isn’t a bad sort, don’t care what you think, 
and I can generally make him listen to reason in the 
long run; but it doesn’t do to push the boy too far.” 

“Very interesting, I’m sure. Is one to understand Mr. 
Baroque is in a pet about something at present ?” 

“I’ll say he is—never seen him worse. But I’m doing 
my best and, with a little help from you, I think we can 
smooth down his bristles before he breaks out and does 
something”—the teeth gleamed significantly—“he might 
be sorry for.” 

“Afraid you’ve come to the wrong shop, Mr. Croce. 


BAROQUE 


73 


I have* t any moral influence with your client, and I 
really doubt if he’d take my interference in good part.” 

The teeth heliographed keen appreciation of this stroke 
of humour. 

“Well! but to get down to cases, M|r. Manship—” 

“I’ll be obliged,” Rodney said, consulting his watch. 

“You must understand how intolerable any man of 
spirit would find this persecution you’re subjecting Mr. 
Baroque to.” 

“I ? Persecuting Angelo Baroque!” 

“I don’t call that too hard a name for it. Think how 
you’d feel, shadowed night and day by private detectives. 
That sort of thing would get on anybody’s nerves. My 
client hasn’t got anything to fear or conceal; but the 
annoyance of it—!” 

“Must be most exasperating,” Rodney agreed. “But 
—while I can’t say I’m surprised—I give you my word 
I know nothing about the matter.” 

Mr. Croce seemed hugely depressed, and pondered this 
denial solemnly. 

“Well!” he concluded—“guess I’ve got to take your 
word for it—” 

“You’re a good guesser, Mr. Croce.” 

“I suppose it couldn’t be possible that your client—” 

“Miss Barocco? I think I can answer for her entire 
ignorance of the business.” 

“All right; only I hope my client doesn’t cut loose and 
do anything foolish.” 

“I hope so, too—for his sake. But tell me: Did this 
notion, that either his sister or I was responsible for his 
being dogged by detectives, originate with Mr. Baroque?” 

“Why! naturally, he thought—” 

“What a mean conscience the poor wretch must have.” 

Opportunately the telephone rang, and Rodney profited 
by the interruption to enquire politely, as he picked up 
the instrument: “Anything else I can do for you, Mr. 
Croce ?” 


74 


BAROQUE 


Mr. Croce said there wasn’t, and took himself off with 
a clouded countenance and no farewell flash of teeth 
at all. 

And Rodney made a mental note to look Ritchey up 
and ask him what he thought about it, first chance he 
got; being privately satisfied that, if there were any 
real excuse for Angelo’s complaints, the latter must have 
mistaken plain-clothes men from Police Headquarters 
for operatives of a private detective agency. 

All that one knew of Angelo’s tastes and ways, as 
well as the considered opinion of Detective Sergeant 
Ritchey, lent plausible colour to that hypothesis. 


XII 


T3EC0NSIDERING the incident in the light of Rit- 
chey’s earnest warning, Rodney inclined to suspect 
a motive which hadn’t shown on the surface of the call 
Mir. Croce had paid him. It seemed a supposition not 
too far-fetched, that Angelo, fed up with nursing an 
unappreciated hate, might be taking cautious preliminary 
steps toward giving it good satisfaction; though precisely 
what he had thought to gain through having Croce inter¬ 
view Rodney remained inexplicable. 

Still, it seemed only judicious to be on one’s guard 
against a sequel of some sort. 

But weeks passed without event, Mr. Croce and his 
client continued completely quiescent, and nothing hap¬ 
pened to remind Rodney of their existence in a less 
roundabout fashion than receipt of a letter from Fran¬ 
cesca, postmarked Florence. 

She had left London, she said, to spend a few weeks 
in Italy with Madame Farusi; her plans for the future 
were hazy. 

Rodney made due acknowledgment to the address she 
gave; but in those days the international postal service 
had not yet recovered its pre-War efficiency, and it was 
no unusual thing for a letter to be six weeks in transit 
between Italy and the United States; and though the 
time seemed long, Rodney did his best to be reasonable, 
and to ease the irk of waiting for Francesca’s reply de¬ 
voted himself to his work more assiduously than ever. 

Even more than it loves a lover, this shiftless world 
loves a worker; and the severest penalty which attaches 
unto success, which comes only through hard work, is 
more work. New clients swarmed in the offices of the 

75 





76 


BAROQUE 


diligent and enterprising young attorney-at-law, more 
than he could comfortably handle; so that he welcomed 
them for the distraction they afforded him, and cursed 
them for their everlasting importunity, in one and the 
same breath. 

One of these was a young Irish-American mechanic 
^named MacManus, who had invented a carburetor of 
revolutionary type which promised to cut gasoline bills 
in half, and who, falling into the wrong hands, had al¬ 
ready been meanly fleeced and was now in a fair way 
to lose his patents altogether. 

Rodney took a fancy to the fellow and, finding that 
he was desperately hard up, espoused his cause without 
a retaining fee. 

The negotiations dragged as such negotiations will, 
when neither side is anxious to take its case into court. 
Winter passed, trailing slush-bedraggled skirts, Spring 
emerged with smiling April face fresh from the washing 
rains of March. Days grew warm and evenings long, 
newspapers dutifully chronicled the annual wrangle 
about daylight saving, steamers Europe-bound sailed with 
full passenger-lists, golf-bags were resurrected, country 
homes came to life; and when, early in May, a premature 
blanket of heat plus humidity closed down over Town, 
the six million groaned as one, then sulkily resigned 
themselves to the promise of a sweltering Summer. 

Of a sudden the other side in the MacManus case took 
fright and made overtures for a settlement. At the close 
of a day-long conference an agreement was arrived at 
and the inventor joyfully departed for his home, prom¬ 
ising to return at four the next afternoon to get the 
certified cheque for which Rodney was to exchange cer¬ 
tain papers bearing his signature. 

The cheque was waiting at the hour appointed, but no 
MacManus came to claim it. Instead, a woman's voice 
with a brogue like velvet informed Rodney by telephone 
that Misther MacMaynus had had an accident, sort of, 


BAROQUE 


77 


and wouldn’t be able to lave his bid for siveral days, 
docther said; and wouldn’t Misther Manship kindly thry 
and see if he couldn’t sind thim the money, because divvle 
a cint was in the house, and the docther would be after 
wanting his pay and the landlord his rint. 

Rodney promised to see to it in person; but a dinner 
conference with another client delayed him, so that it 
was in the dim end of the gloaming that his taxicab put 
him down in front of an unlovely tenement in the remote 
hinterland of the upper East Side. 

Abstractedly (for some reason he was mooning about 
Francesca more persistently than usual, that night) he 
paid off the driver and turned toward the house. Too 
late it was borne in upon him that he should have kept 
the conveyance waiting; one would have far to walk 
before one found another in that part of Town. 

His sentimental dreams dissipated by this reflection, 
he looked about, took stock of the neighbourhood, and 
realized with some surprise that his life had been so long 
restricted to walks and ways of the well-to-do, he had 
almost forgotten New York retained such quarters as 
this, haunts of poverty, wretchedness, vice, and squalor 
unrelieved. 

From corner to corner of the long cross-town block, 
unbroken ranks of beetling old-law tenements walled in 
the street, oozing from every window, door and fire- 
escape humanity in the raw, less than half-washed, 
largely half-naked, and wholly unashamed. Sidewalks 
and roadway teemed with children in the screaming, 
sticky stage. The air was heavy with heat and the ef¬ 
fluvia of garbage-cans that cluttered the curbs, disputing 
for place with push-carts above which naptha torches 
belched gusty, lurid flares. 

A number of slatternly women, one openly nursing a 
baby, were huddled in the entrance to the tenement 
where Rodney’s client lived. They made way grudgingly, 
and when Rodney asked them where to find MacManus 


78 


BAROQUE 


showed him blank eyes or, shaking their heads, responded 
in tongues that meant nothing to him, though he thought 
he recognized the sounds of Yiddish and Italian. 

Then one called in a man from the sidewalk, a hang¬ 
dog lout with the face and carriage of a Parisian Apache; 
and this one found enough strongly accented English to 
direct Rodney to the fourth floor back. 

Ascending the noisome well of the stairway, his nos¬ 
trils assailed at every landing by new combinations of 
odours, Rodney was reminded of a friend, a physician 
whose early professional days had been spent in minister¬ 
ing to the miseries of tenants of such rookeries, and who 
asserted that, when called to doctor a new patient, he 
had never asked his way but smelt it, following his nose 
to the lair of boiled cabbage, if the name were Irish, or 
fried fish if it were Jewish, or garlic if it were Italian. 

The man MacManus lay abed in a veritable cocoon 
of bandages which, however, could not altogether hide 
twinkling Irish eyes and the fetching smile with which 
he recounted his misadventure of the previous night. It 
seemed that, coming home elated, he had stopped in at 
the corner, “a dirrty Wop joint,” to celebrate the victory 
which Rodney had won for him with the vin du pays, 
a concoction known by the simple name of “hootch.” In 
perfectly natural sequence, as MacManus understood it, 
there had been a bit of a shindig, from which he had 
emerged not without honour if in the battered state 
visible to the caller. 

“They’re a mane lot, thim Wops,” his wife commented 
—“an’ sorra th’ daay we was iver so poor we had to 
move into this livin’ nist av thim!” 

But now they were poor no longer, and it was all 
thanks to Rodney. . . . 

He left as quickly as he could in decency, to escape 
their overpowering gratitude, and was half-way down 
the last flight of stairs before he fancied something sin¬ 
ister in the changed aspect of the lower hallway. 


BAROQUE 


79 


The women who had cluttered the entrance were gone. 
In their stead Rodney saw half a dozen young ruffians 
lounging against the walls, cigarettes drooping from 
loose-lipped mouths, faces of unwholesome pallor all ex¬ 
pressionless as silently they watched Rodney come down 
to them. 

He knew a little thrill of alarm, but it was something 
momentary, he shook it off with a shrug of self-contempt 
that he should be so facile a prey to imaginary terrors. 
Even assuming that he had anything to fear from An¬ 
gelo’s hostility, how should the latter have guessed that 
Rodney would be in that evil neighbourhood at that hour 
of that particular night? 

The supposition was too absurd . . . 

But the group in the doorway made no offer to let 
him pass, and when he touched the nearest sleeve and 
uttered a pleasant “Beg pardon,” his voice was drowned 
out by a snarl from the far side of the knot. 

“That’s him ! Kill the bastard!” 

A heavy blow on the chest sent him staggering back 
beyond the foot of the staircase. He caught at the 
newel-post to save himself a fall, and in the same breath 
saw the pack closing in. 

And then he was fighting for his very life. 


XIII 


N EVER an instant, its victim reckoned, was the issue 
of that onslaught in question. His assailants had 
hardly been in character if it had entered their heads 
to give him a fighting chance. They were six or seven 
to one, and on their own chosen ground; while the back 
part of the hallway into which Rodney was carried by 
their first savage rush, the nucleus of a writhing knot 
of bodies, was terra incognita to him, a simple, dark cul- 
de-sac. He could only do his utmost to give as good as 
he got, and this in full confidence that, the better his 
success in repaying punishment with punishment, the 
more sure he might feel that the end would come with 
a cold kiss of steel. 

The business went forward in a strange sort of silence. 
For a little there was a rumour, that could not have car¬ 
ried to the street, of broken and hurried breathing, dull 
mutters of rage, scuffling of feet, with now and again 
a smart crack of fist on flesh. Then abruptly weight of 
numbers carried the day, Rodney fell heavily against a 
door, and instantly drew up his knees to protect his 
abdomen, and with crossed forearms guarded his head. 
In the next few seconds he suffered enough from vicious 
kicks and grinding heels to make him sick and faint, so 
that, perceiving his plight as hopeless, he grew dully 
impatient for the time when unconsciousness would numb 
his pain . . . 

But his persecution met with a check as unexpected 
to its authors as to their prey. The door opened against 
which Rodney lay in a huddle, a sharply imperative voice 
saluted the pack, and the assault was suspended as some¬ 
body strode across the body of the half-conscious man 

80 


BAROQUE 


81 


and began a harangue in accents somehow remotely 
familiar—a voice that one would surely know if one were 
not too far gone to make the requisite effort of memory. 

Neither was what it said intelligible, for the tongue 
was not English. 

Ungentle hands seized Rodney’s arms and hoisted him 
to his feet. Winded, spent, trembling, he rested in half¬ 
daze against the open door, held up on either side by 
two of his late adversaries—and face to face with Angelo 
Baroque. 

Sardonic triumph painted broadly upon his handsome 
mask of a young faun, Angelo held himself with the 
jaunty carriage of a conqueror, though he had taken no 
hand in the attack and, unlike the others, of whom every 
one showed some sign of damage endured, was immacu¬ 
late in respect of the shouting smartness of his attire of 
a leader among gangmen. 

Seeing recognition flicker in Rodney’s half-glazed stare, 
Angelo spat an Italian epithet into the face of the Ameri¬ 
can, then with a spirited tilt of the head and a curling 
up cast round the ring of degraded countenances for 
sycophantic applause. It came in a break of grim 
chuckles. Somebody questioned him, apparently in sur¬ 
prise, and he replied with a phrase or two in a derisive 
key that won another laugh. 

Then with a change to truculent decision, he addressed 
his henchmen more brusquely, and wound up with an 
order to the men who were holding Rodney’s arms. 
Immediately they released him, and dropped back, grin¬ 
ning in anticipation. Angelo stepped close, gave the 
American a glimpse of his scornful smile, and with a 
violent hand thrust him, reeling, across the threshold, to 
trip, go prone to the floor, and strike his head against 

the leg of an iron bedstead. 

Behind him the door crashed as it were consciousness 

going out in a clap of thunder . . . 

He came to himself, with no knowledge of the lapse 


82 


BAROQUE 


of time, staring groggily up at a gas-jet whose fan, of 
bluish flame edged with yellow, was roaring and whistling 
directly overhead. 

Cognizance of his surroundings was something that 
came in details, each gained at cost of augmented agony 
in a throbbing head. 

Face and hair dripping wet, coat and waistcoat unbut¬ 
toned, collar and necktie missing, the pillow damp be¬ 
neath his head, Rodney lay upon a bed in a room whose 
atmosphere was close and foul with unclean ghosts of 
dead cookery. A wall coloured with bilious distemper 
held the dark oblong of a doorway at the foot of the bed. 

Unable to see more without moving his head, when 
he essayed this Rodney groaned aloud and was blinded 
by pain that wildly danced, a living flame, within his 
skull. 

But presently it subsided, vision cleared, and he per¬ 
ceived that there was a second door in the wall near the 
head of the bed, where Angelo was standing, in a pose 
of strained and apprehensive attention, with an ear to 
the panels. 

Catching Rodney’s perplexed eye, the boy frowned, 
but curiously, a frown of worry rather than the scowl 
of hatred which experience had taught one to expect of 
him. Then he shook his head slightly and signed for 
silence with a finger to his lips. 

Utterly confounded, Rodney made no stir, but fol¬ 
lowed in deepening wonder the actions of Angelo as that 
one, after a long pause in listening, nodded in apparent 
satisfaction, swung away to the foot of the bed, and 
called urgently, yet in guarded tones, to somebody in 
the room beyond. 

As he darted back to his former stand, turned the key 
in the lock and unfastened a chain-bolt, a woman entered 
from the farther room, a creature of mature figure with 
a shawl caught so closely over her head that her features 
were not visible. 


BAROQUE 


83 


She went quickly to Angelo, who had cautiously opened 
the door and was peering out. Evidently reassured by 
his reconnaissance, with a parting mutter of instruction, 
he let the woman pass through to the hallway, then 
reclosed and bolted the door. 

Turning to the bed, with a gesture of impatience he 
threw off the golf cap which had shadowed his features, 
sank upon his knees, and caught one of Rodney’s hands 
tenderly between both his own. 

“Mr. Manship! Are you in pain? What can I do 
for you ? I am so, so sorry!” 

Hearing that voice of music, staring up into that face 
solicitous and compassionate which hung above his own, 
Rodney was able to articulate one word only— 

" Francesca!” 


XIV 


S,” breathed the girl—“it is I. But not so loud.” 



She cast a glance of misgiving toward the door 
and, resting cool fingers lightly on Rodney’s lips, listened 
intently for a moment. But apparently she heard nothing 
alarming, for she was quick to return her pitiful interest 
to the man whose life she had saved. 

“You are suffering. Tell me what to do!” 

“It’s nothing,” Rodney grunted—“I mean, nothing 
much. Pretty well beaten up but—I guess—no bones 
broken. Let’s see.” 

He set his teeth and with determination roused on an 
elbow. Though he was successful in keeping back the 
groan, the girl saw his eyes narrow and the muscles of 
his jaw grow tense; and she gave a cry of sympathy. 
But Manship waved aside her offer to let him back again 
upon the pillow, and swung his feet down to the floor. 
After which he found it necessary to hold his skull to¬ 
gether with both hands for a while, lest it rend itself 
asunder. 

The girl left him to fetch water from the adjoining 
room. When she came back, Rodney was sitting up and 
gingerly experimenting. 

“Arms and legs a bit bruised,” he reported with a wry 
smile—“but apparently intact—likewise ribs. Guess that 
crack on the head was the worst, after all.” 

“And my fault. I’m so sorry, but I had to—because 
they believed I was Angelo.” 

“Couldn’t know I’d take a tumble and hit my fool 
head on that blessed bed,” Rodney defended her. “Be¬ 
sides—I’d ’ve been disappointed, too—if you hadn’t 
played up, just then.” He gulped from the glass she held 


84 


BAROQUE 


85 


to his lips, and felt better. “Sure you’re not Angelo?” 
he demanded, looking up. “If you’re Francesca, then I 
must be in Italy. How come?” 

“I can’t tell you now, there isn’t time. Later. I’ve 
been back almost a week. As soon as you feel strong 
enough, we must be going. Every minute here is dan¬ 
gerous. Angelo is sure to learn too soon . . . Do you 
feel able ?” 

“Do my best.” Rodney caught hold of the foot of the 
bed and pulled himself up to a standing position. For 
a moment he swayed with eyes shut, then steadied. 
“That’s better,” he announced, blinking. “Good old con¬ 
stitution-tough and'rugged—stands a lot. Where do 
we go from here?” 

“Wait—I’ll have to show you. We daren’t leave by 
way of the street.” 

Francesca extinguished the gas, found Rodney’s hand, 
and drew him through the darkness into the other room, 
where the shape of a window was visible as* a dim rect¬ 
angle in the mirk. From this they looked out into a 
glimmering well of night, spangled with lighted windows, 
laced with clothes-lines. Then the girl quietly lifted the 
lower sash, letting in air that might by courtesy be termed 
fresh, with sounds of nocturnal revelry, squalling of 
infants, harmony of an accordeon and guitar, cacophony 
of a domestic free-for-all in one of the neighbouring flats. 

The iron platform of a fire-escape ran level with the 
window-sill. “We can drop from this to the back-yard,” 
the girl’s whisper advised; “then—I know a way. Think 
you can manage—?” 

“Anything to get you out of this hole. I’m all right. 
Let’s go!” 

The lithe body in man’s clothing slipped out upon the 
grating and disappeared. Rodney followed less nimbly, 
breathing hard. There was one spot in his ribs, where 
a particularly vicious kick had got home, the hurt of 
which, magnified by every movement, was purely hellish. 


86 


BAROQUE 


Otherwise he felt somewhat better, more clear of head 
—though mystified no end. 

By means of a permanent iron ladder running through 
a break in the platform, they were able to let themselves 
down till, hanging by their hands from the lowermost 
rung, their feet were not far from the ground. But it 
was quite dark, and Rodney, who had no means of know¬ 
ing how great the drop would be, was agreeably disap¬ 
pointed in the outcome, if more shaken up, even so, than 
he liked. 

The tenement yard was a simple black hole, for gener¬ 
ations a common catch-all, and there was only a dull 
refraction from overhead to show the way. However, 
Francesca seemed sure of her ground; and Rodney, 
clinging blindly to her hand, was led through a gap in a 
fence into another backyard, then into another and yet 
others, so that he had lost count and sense of direction 
entirely when at length they sped through a dark mal¬ 
odorous basement and emerged—like divers coming up 
for air—to the lights and comparative fragrance of an 
open street. 

Here the girl caught Rodney’s arm and hustled him 
relentlessly. Though she knew every uncalculated move¬ 
ment meant pain to him, there was no help for it. Her 
murmur warned him that they must not think themselves 
safe anywhere in that quarter; every moment they were 
in danger of running into Angelo or some one of his 
fellows. Rodney protested feebly, asking what of the 
police. To this Francesca replied with a short laugh; 
luck alone could save them, she asserted, a fair turn of 
luck that would enable them to make good their rendez¬ 
vous with Marcella. That name Rodney repeated stu¬ 
pidly. With a hint of impatience Francesca replied that 
Marcella was the woman who had left the room shortly 
after he had regained consciousness: “I sent her to find 
a taxicab and have it waiting at a safe distance.” 

It was proved presently that the old nurse had not 


BAROQUE 


87 


failed them. In the shadow of the Third Avenue Ele¬ 
vated they came upon the vehicle. Marcella, who had 
been loitering in conversation with the driver, moved 
aside as Francesca conducted Rodney to the door, 
stopped, and held out her hand with an admirably mascu¬ 
line gesture. 

“Well!” she said cheerily, in the very voice of Angelo 
—“glad to’ve seen you—and good night!” 

Rodney eyed her in complete perplexity. 

“What— ?” 

In a lowered voice the girl added almost angrily: 
“Don’t you see that lot across the street watching us? 
I don’t know who they are. Please go!” 

A glance confirmed the fact that they were being 
favoured with the inquisitive interest of a group of loaf¬ 
ers in the doorway of a saloon on the opposite corner— 
one of those mysterious survivals of our time, a common 
groggery which persisted in flaunting an apparently not 
unprosperous existence in the face of a community 
pledged to absolute prohibition. 

But to Rodney it didn’t matter that they were observed; 
nothing mattered but the fact that the woman he loved, 
the woman whom he had believed to be many thousands 
of miles away, had strangely come back into his life, in 
the guise and garb of a handsome if dangerous young 
blackguard, and—having saved him from being beaten 
to death—was now coolly proposing not only to dismiss 
him with a handshake of everyday but to return, alone, 
to that deadly slum. 

“Are you mad ?” he muttered. 

“I think you are,” she retorted in the same pitch. 
“Haven’t you realized yet what danger—?” 

“Do you imagine I will leave you in it?” 

“If you don’t—” 

“Not a step without you,” he firmly interrupted. “If 
you must go back to—that—I go with you.” 

“How dare you interfere!” she blazed. 


88 


BAROQUE 


“How dared you, a while ago? Now I owe my very 
life to you. Don’t think you can so easily evade that 
obligation.” 

For a moment, braving the tempest of her eyes, he 
, wondered if this might not be Angelo, after all. . . . 

“It’s no go,” he persisted doggedly. “I don’t leave 
you here—that’s flat.” 

“O well!”—the shift of tone and manner was both 
instantaneous and bewildering; and now again it was 
the voice of Angelo that carried clearly to the group 
across the street—“don’t mind if I do. Sure! I’ll ride 
with you a ways.” 

And with no more ado the girl swung open the door 
of the cab and climbed in. Rodney, delaying only to 
give the chauffeur the address of his club, followed— 
incidentally remarking that Marcella had discreetly 
vanished. 


XV 


T>UT the show of cheerful acquiescence with which 
Francesca had given lasted no longer than was 
needed to let Rodney shut the cab door and drop into 
the seat by her side. Then in the broken and fugitive 
illumination of the street lights he saw that her face was 
averted, revealing only the sweet round of her nearer 
cheek. She had drawn back into her corner, too, as if 
to get as far away from him as possible, and a hand rest¬ 
ing upon one trousered knee was clenched into a tight 
fist. 

“Francesca!” he said; but she paid no heed. 

He bent forward to look into her face. The mouth 
was sullen, the brows were level above eyes like sultry 
pools. 

“Francesca—!” 

All at once she turned on him. 

“Oh! do be still. You’ve done your best to spoil every¬ 
thing. Now for pity’s sake! let me be—let me think 
out, if I can, some way to make good the damage you’ve 
done.” 

“I! What have I done that any man in my shoes 
wouldn’t? Could I sneak off home and save my own 
skin and leave you to blunder madly back into that 
danger ?” 

“There was no danger.” 

He blankly parrotted: “No danger!” 

“For you, yes—but none for me. If you had gone 
when I begged you, nothing could have happened to me.” 

“But not five minutes ago you were warning me to 
look for a clash with Angelo any minute—” 

“Warning you—not myself. What have I to fear from 
that one?” 


89 


90 


BAROQUE 


“You know him better than I do, but you can’t expect 
me to count on his never forgetting you’re his twin sister 
when you hound him the way you do—” 

“Hound him?” 

“With your vow of vengeance upon the heads of those 
who were responsible for your father’s death. That’s 
what you’re doing—that’s why you’ve come back without 
letting anybody know, and buried yourself in that unholy 
tenement district—isn’t it? What other reason—?” 

“You seem to believe it was Angelo—” 

“I’ve nothing to go on but suspicions you yourself put 
into my head.” 

“I’m not sure. No matter what may seem suspicious, I 
can’t believe that my own brother, my father’s son—” 

“Still, you won’t rest till you know the truth.” 

“No.” 

“And if it should turn out it was Angelo . . .” 

After a moment she said shortly: “Please don’t ask 
me. 

“Very well; but in that case, don’t ask me to believe 
you’d show him any mercy, or he’d expect any at your 
hands.” 

The girl maintained an obdurate silence. 

“Francesca: give up this mad adventure!” 

“You don’t know what you’re asking.” 

“I’nj asking you to come to your senses”—she laughed 
scornfully—“not to go on risking your life for a wild 
revenge that would turn to ashes in your grasp if you 
should ever realize it.” 

“It’s my life—” 

“Not altogether, it’s mine as well. You’re life to me 
—and everything else—because I love you.” 

She turned her face fully to him; but though all his 
heart was in the eyes with which he searched, he could 
read nothing in her look, guess nothing of her mind from 
the shadowy and enigmatic countenance she had to show 
him by that fitful play of light and shade. 


BAROQUE 


91 


In reproach she cried: “Oh! why did you say that ?” 

“Forgive me. You’ve known it a long time—that I 
loved you—and so have I, ever since I first saw you.” 

“You shouldn’t have said it—!” 

“Why not? It’s true, it’s the reason why I can’t help 
but worry and pray for you—why I must reason with 
you, no matter if it does make you angry—” 

“I am not angry,” she said, and let a hand rest upon 
the back of his. “I was vexed, a little, because I saw 
my plans going wrong; though all along I knew it wasn’t 
your fault, and that you couldn’t be reasonable, let me 
have my own way without dispute—you being you and, 
as you say, in love with me. Forgive me my ill temper 
•—Rodney—and don’t for a moment think I don’t know 
what honour you have done me.” 

“But it is you who do me an honour when you let me 
love you.” 

For the first time in this talk, shyly, wistfully, she 
smiled a little. 

“Why! I’m afraid I can’t stop you—can I? If I could, 
I suppose I ought to. At least, I shouldn’t encourage 
you.” 

“Meaning,” he said brokenly, “there’s no hope for 
me?” 

“Meaning I have no right to permit any man to care 
for me, so long as my mind is—as it is. I suppose an 
avenging Nemesis”—she smiled again—“isn’t in the right 
way of living to have a sweetheart—is she?—the life 
work of a conscientious Nemesis being an extra hazard¬ 
ous occupation and making her a poor risk both as an 
insurance and as a matrimonial prospect.” 

“I love you,” he groaned—“and you laugh at me!” 

“No, Rodney; I’m not laughing, just trying to smile 
a little, to wink back the tears. You see, you—you’ve 
made me so happy I rather want to cry.” 

Rodney sat up suddenly, but she drew away her hand 


92 BAROQUE 

and shrank back into her corner with a small gesture of 
pleading. 

“You care—whether I love you or not?” he incredu¬ 
lously cried. 

She nodded with starry eyes. “It’s sweet to be loved 
by a man one can like and respect,” she said. “Yes, my 
dear, I care—too much, perhaps, for my own peace of 
mind—not enough, perhaps, to make you as happy as 
you deserve—but enough, at least, to beg a great favour 
of you, and to make you a promise in return.” 

“Tell me . . ” 

“Promise first not to make love to me again till I give 
you leave.” 

“How can you ask that? How can I promise—?” 

“Perhaps it won’t be long, Rodney; only until Pm free 
to answer you. That’s what I promise you in return— 
not to keep you waiting longer than I must.” 

“Free? How are you bound?” 

“By my vow to my dead father. When I promised 
to find his murderers, I promised not to love till I had 
done so.” Rodney made inarticulate noises of expostu¬ 
lation. “No!” she insisted, “but I had to. You see, even 
then I knew there was danger I might let myself be 
weakened in my purpose. Even now I am forgetting!” 

She bent forward to peer out of the window. 

Several minutes since the cab had turned down Fifth 
Avenue. The dark bulk of the Metropolitan Museum 
by night was now some distance ahead. The girl nodded 
thoughtfully at sight of it. 

“And now I want you to be generous to me again, 
Rodney. I want you to drop me in front of the Metro¬ 
politan. I can get another taxi there.” 

“But why?” 

“Two reasons: I don’t trust this driver—I don’t know 
anything about him. It was a risk I had to run, to let 
Marcella pick up the first cab she could find. You told 
him to drive to your club; you can discharge him there 






























































































“ I’m waiting your explanation,” 


she said coldly. Page 92 



























BAROQUE 9a 

and go on to your rooms. But I don’t want him to know 
where I go.” 

“Or me, either, I infer.” 

“Or you, either—in this instance.” 

“You’re going back there?” 

“Be kind, don’t insist on my answering.” 

“I can’t let you—” 

“But if I promise you, Rodney, wherever I’m going, it 
isn’t into danger?” 

“How can I be sure?” 

“Because I’ll make you another promise: I shan’t be 
much more than an hour. Then I will meet you, wher¬ 
ever you say, and explain everything—all that you’ve 
found so mystifying. . . . Isn’t that a fair bargain?” 

“If I could trust you to take care of yourself 1” 

“Why! don’t you think I’ve proved I can ? Besides, 
in the end, you’ll have to, you know.” She laughed a 
little, not defiantly, but with a note of fondness. “You 
can’t kidnap me. It isn’t being done this season.” 

“I don’t know—I’ve got a mind to try.” 

“You’d find it dreadfully embarrassing, don’t you 
think? Where could you take me? Not to your club, 
because I’m not what I seem. Not to a hotel—no safe 
and sane hotel will take in a young woman disguised as 
a man. Not to the police station—because I just won’t 
go!” 

She met his gloomy and distrustful stare with a twinkle 
of light malice. 

“But don’t be downcast, Mr. Manship; you shall surely 
see me again tonight. You have my word.” 

She tapped sharply on the glass behind the driver. 
The taxi swerved toward the curb, and slowed down. 

Outwitted and grasping at straws, “Where will you 
meet me, then?” Rodney demanded. 

“You’ll be home in the course of an hour ?” It was the 
voice of Angelo again, as the cab stopped and the girl 
jumped out: “I’ll give you a ring and make a date.” 


XVI 


PREOCCUPATION with the mystery and magic of 
that romantic meeting and its sequel, Francesca’s 
frank confession that she was anything but indifferent 
to his sentimental interest, anxiety for her welfare in 
that dark hazard upon which she had embarked so light- 
heartedly on leaving him, resentful admiration of the 
high-handed way with which she had overruled all his 
efforts to turn her from her wilful course—these kept 
self-consciousness in eclipse so profound that the taxicab 
was at a standstill in front of his club before Rodney 
remembered the grievous dilapidation of his person. 

And he had faithfully promised Francesca, in view 
of the unlikely but still possible contingency that this 
driver might be one of Angelo’s allies, not to go on to 
his rooms without changing cabs! 

Rodney groaned “O the devil!”—faltering on the step 
and viewing the club portals in utterest dismay. 

But the door-porter was at his elbow and eyeing him 
with amazement there was no disguising. Too late to 
draw back now: the story of his appearance in this 
shocking state in any event was bound to spread. 

Rodney thrust a bill into the hand of the porter, told 
him to pay off the taxi, and turning up his coat-collar 
round an indecently naked neck, trotted into the club. 

As hastily as might be he delivered himself into the 
hands of one of the club valets; but to do so had to pass 
through the public rooms and court the supercilious eye¬ 
brows of the steady-paced member and the more rude 
amusement of the low-minded, neither of whom could 
be persuaded to see in his appearance anything but the 

94 


BAROQUE 95 

sad outcome of an only too successful adventure with 
boot-liquor. 

While the damage to his garments was being in some 
measure repaired, he sent a request to the door-porter 
to keep an eye peeled and let him know if the cab that 
had brought him seemed disposed to tarry in the offing. 

Word came back that it had already picked up a 
fellow club-member and whisked him off to an address 
on the upper West Side. Which might have seemed 
gratifying if Rodney hadn’t, in the meantime, reminded 
himself that Angelo knew perfectly well where he lived 
and, consequently, where to look for him at such times 
as decent, law-abiding bodies ought to be at home. 

In other words, he had indulged Francesca’s request tt> 
no conceivable profit, but much to the contrary, at the 
cost of giving his fair young reputation a most lamen¬ 
table black eye. 

Rare temper winged his heels as he strode homeward, 
but was instantly diverted when, on entering his rooms, 
he heard the grumble of the telephone bell. He fairly 
flung himself upon the neck of the instrument. 

“Mr. Manship? Mr. Baroque speaking. Remember 
me?” 

The half-surly, half-truculent mockery of those ac¬ 
cents was so well-remembered and so true that Rodney’s 
heart stood still in apprehension, and momentarily sus¬ 
pended breathing rendered his response to a degree inco¬ 
herent. But then he heard Francesca laugh quietly, and 
all was right with the world once more—or as nearly 
right as it could be while one had no hope of delivering 
the girl from the dominion of her idee fixe. 

“What’s the matter ? Does it always upset you to hear 
the voice of one of your gentlemen friends?” 

“You frightened me,” Rodney explained simply. “For 
an instant I thought—” 

“I’m sorry.” There was real contrition in her natural 
voice, but it was mixed with amusement. “I only wanted 


96 


BAROQUE 


to warn you I’m apt to be delayed, I don’t know quite 
how long; but you’re not to fret or do anything foolish. 
Nothing can happen to me.” 

“But you promised—!” 

“I haven’t reneged, Mr. Manship, and won’t—more 
than this much: I don’t think it would be wise for me to 
meet you anywhere in public, I’ll come to see you instead. 
Does that shock you? But it’s perfectly proper for you 
to receive young men of your acquaintance even at mid¬ 
night or thereabouts—isn’t it ? I shan’t be later.” 

All Rodney’s remonstrances spent their force vainly 
against a lightly bantering rejoinder to the effect that 
Francesca was sorry she had so little time to spare, other¬ 
wise she would be only too glad to argue out the question 
with him. To which an airy au revoir was added, a re¬ 
ceiver clicked into its hook, and Rodney found himself 
reading an impassioned screed to an unresponsive wire. 

So there was nothing to be done about it, nothing but 
grin and bear it. Nevertheless he kept his mind busy 
while taking a hot soak and a cold shower to ease the 
aches in bones and muscles, revolving a dozen plans to 
come between the girl and her will without calling down 
her resentment upon his head. The most promising he 
endeavoured to put into effect after dressing; but it failed 
of immediate fruit because Police Headquarters, ad¬ 
dressed by telephone, pretended to know nothing what¬ 
ever about the whereabouts of Detective Sergeant Ritchey 
of the Narcotic Squad. Which seemed most exasperat¬ 
ing, since one assumed—from the complaint which Mr. 
Leo Croce had filed on behalf of his client, to the 
effect that the latter was being haunted by detectives— 
that Ritchey was probably keeping himself tolerably well 
informed concerning the interests and activities of Angelo 
Baroque. 

It was long after midnight before the steady aggrava¬ 
tion of anxiety was relieved by a brisk thrill of the door¬ 
bell heralding the introduction to the living-room of a 


BAROQUE 


97 


devil-may-care young rip, with a golf-cap down over one 
eye, a cigarette drooping from the underlip, the easy 
slouch of a thorough man of the underworld, and a nota¬ 
ble irradiation of self-complacence. An apparition so 
foreign to those disastrous shapes with which Rodney’s 
forebodings had been peopled, that he was stricken mo¬ 
mentarily dumb and stood gaping like a half-wit, still 
holding the hall door. 

Remarking this oversight, his caller gently disengaged 
the knob from Rodney’s grasp, shut the door, and made 
sure that its patent lock had latched. 

“Good of you to sit up so late for me, old thing,” said 
the voice of Angelo as it must have been with those whom 
that one liked—if, indeed, one were warranted in assum¬ 
ing Angelo had ever liked anybody but himself. “Hope 
you haven’t minded. Anyhow, it’s no good your getting 
smoky, because I couldn’t help myself: business is busi¬ 
ness, you know.” 

The impudence of this address recollected Rodney’s 
wits from their wool-gathering. 

“You young imp!” he cried with a laugh that did not 
quite succeed in veneering indignation. His impulsive 
hands clipped the shoulders of that graceless, charming 
figure. “If I gave you half you deserve—!” 

“But you won’t,” the voice of Francesca stated. 
“Please, Mr. Manship!” 

With gentle dignity she freed her shoulders and turned 
away, removing the golf-cap. 

“Oh, I’m sorry!” Rodney contritely cried. 

Instantly she gave him again her wistful and cajoling 
smile. 

“It’s all right, Rodney—all my fault. I shouldn’t have 
teased you. . . . But what’s the matter?” 

He was in a stare of horror. 

“Your hair!” he groaned—“your beautiful hair!” 

With a rueful moue Francesca passed a hand over the 


98 BAROQUE 

closely cropped hair that so well revealed the fine forma¬ 
tion of her head. 

“It is too bad,” she confessed. “I howled like fun the 
first time I saw myself in a mirror, afterwards. But it 
had to be done, it would have been fatal otherwise. . . . 
Never mind!” she chirped up in a twinkling. “I had a 
noble wig made out of my shorn sacrifice; and this will 
grow like mad, anyway, when I can let it.” 

But Rodney wagged a mournful head and would not 
be comforted. 

“It was criminal!” he declared. “If you could go to 
such lengths as that, how can I hope that you will ever 
listen to me?” 

“Ah! but you are mistaken, and unfair, too.” She 
made a demure face. “Didn’t I listen prettily to you in 
the cab tonight? And answer you back with almost 
unmaidenly directness, too? And all when I knew it 
was wrong, I had no right to ! No, no!” With a gesture 
of gay but firm denial she halted an impetuous movement. 
“I’m not inviting renewal of hostilities, sir—our armistice 
stands. O be kind to me, Rodney! be generous. You 
know from what happened tonight how hard it is for me, 
how weak I am and infirm of purpose—when it’s you!” 

Disarmed and silenced, he shrugged. 

“Besides,” Francesca told him in a flash of triumph, 
“it’s too late, dear friend. All the good will in the world 
could not save me now. This very night I have taken 
the final, fatal step, I’ve crossed my Rubicon; I too have 
become initiate and taken the vows, put myself on a 
plane of equality with Angelo ; I’m his comrade now, his 
peer; he can’t deny or dislodge me, he can’t breathe one 
little whisper to betray me except at peril of his life.” 

“Good Heavens!” Heedless of her prohibition, Rod¬ 
ney in a stride covered the space between them and caught 
both her hands into an agitated grasp. “What new in¬ 
sanity— ?” 


BAROQUE 


99 


“Only what I’ve been intending all along. I could have 
done nothing if I hadn’t, my hands would have remained 
forever impotent, my eyes blind. Don’t think I’ve gone 
to all this trouble for anything so childish as to play a 
game with Angelo or masquerade as him. It was graver 
business, Rodney. . . . But let me go. I promised to 
tell you everything; and so I will when you give me back 
my hands and let me make myself comfortable.” 

By this time Rodney knew his book too well to oppose 
her. 

“As you will,” he said, releasing her. “But I hardly 
need say I’m worried sick . . 

“You are a dear; and I’d be an ungrateful wretch if 
I failed to keep my word. You shall know all, sir; but 
it’s an awfully long story and . . . Please, Rodney, I’m 
frightfully hungry. Isn’t there some place near—?” 

“Quite near. You won’t have to leave this room, in 
fact, if you’ll be content with coffee and sandwiches, 
things like that. When you telephoned you’d be late, I 
foresaw this moment, so called up the club and had them 
send over a cold supper.” 

“You do think of everything—don’t you?” the girl 
cried, gazing enraptured upon the little table set for two 
which Rodney disclosed by folding back a screen. 

“Yes,” he admitted, with a becoming absence of false 
modesty—“I do. That is to say, I think all the time of 
you, and you’re everything . . 

Some time later he replaced the screen in front of a 
devastated table, and looked round to find that Francesca 
established just out of range of the light cast by the 
shaded study lamp, where she was lounging in a chair 
whose roominess made her slight, boyish body seem all 
the slighter. 

He drew up a chair to face her. 

“Now!” he firmly reminded her. 

With her pensive smile of a child, she came out of a 



100 


BAROQUE 


fit of abstraction, nodded thoughtfully, and then, focus¬ 
sing a reminiscent gaze upon far distances, began a quiet 
recountal of adventures that—the more by contrast with 
her simple and engaging manner—seemed to Rodney as 
fantastic as anything in the Thousand and One Nights. 


XVII 


T) RECISELY when the first Barocco became an adher- 
A ent of the Camorra is a question clouded with im¬ 
penetrable mists of unwritten history. It probably wasn’t 
a great while after the Society came into being, in the 
bad old Bourbon days of the early Nineteenth Century, 
when it was generated by spontaneous combustion, so to 
speak, in the festering sties of Neapolitan prisons. For 
when the Bourbons were functioning at the peak of their 
really superb efficiency as despots, the prisons of Naples 
were simple, swarming pounds wherein political suspects 
of every grade, from every stratum of society, were 
huddled indiscriminately with the foulest offscourings of 
the city’s sinks and stews. 

Condemn any man, no matter how fine his grain, to 
the society of criminals for months or years on end, for 
some trivial offense or for none at all, for nothing more 
venal than the misfortune of being under suspicion of 
harbouring treasonable sentiments toward a government 
guilty of heinous crimes against the people; and that man 
will leave prison, if not a manufactured criminal, at least 
saturate with criminal sympathies. 

Thus in Naples few can boast that their families have 
not had, at some time during the last century, some form 
of affiliation, however indirect or secret, with the Ca¬ 
morra. It is debatable whether there were any who did 
not pay it tribute in one form or another. 

Now it is to be borne in mind that, though Barocco 
is an old name and an honoured one in Naples, a good 
percentage of its wearers in every generation had been 
born “baroque,” in mutiny against every law of God and 
man. Not one but many a cadet of the house must have 

101 


102 


BAROQUE 


suffered incarceration as an enemy of the State, under 
Bourbon rule; and native predisposition for the forbidden 
side must have made their spirits fertile soil for the seed 
of Camorrist doctrines. The memory of their oldest runs 
not to the contrary of that time when some member of 
the family was not involved in the intrigues of the Ca- 
morra, hand in glove with one or the other of its branches, 
the Camorra alta, “the swell mob,” or the Camorra bassa, 
the primary organization of thieves, panders, and as¬ 
sassins. 

So it must have seemed not unnatural that the “ba¬ 
roque” half of the twins, Liborio and Aniello, should 
enlist in the Camorra and ultimately involve his brother in 
its machinations. And though it may have been that 
Liborio, always the “man of spirit,” at first aspired to 
nothing more reprehensible than the prestige of fellow¬ 
ship with those tremendous bloods, the Camorra elegante 
(or alta) it was inevitable that he should eventually 
gravitate into the Camorra bassa, that fundamental struc¬ 
ture of banded criminality wherein the real strength of 
the order lay. 

A young man of ability and intelligence, with a way 
of his own that made him friends and attracted a train 
of sycophants, he became in time a figure of high stature 
in any company of Camorristi, “a coming man,” conse¬ 
quently one to be reckoned with in the esteem of those 
who held the sinister symbols of the society’s vast and 
secret power. 

A little distance into the mazes of the Mala Vita 
Aniello followed his twin, unwillingly and with such 
cumulative repugnance as made him presently pull up 
and refuse to go farther even for Liborio’s sake. Thus 
far he had come in the hope of reclaiming his brother; 
the bonds of affection were strong between the two, in 
those days, there was nothing Aniello would not have 
done to save Liborio from himself and from his second 
self as well, that shadow of evil which had fastened to 


BAROQUE 


108 


his heels, like a shape of black sorcery he might never 
hope to out foot, the shadow of the Camorra. But how¬ 
ever little the extent of his venture into the labyrinth, it 
had been enough to give Aniello glimpses of farther 
reaches where ulcerous corruption walked naked and 
unspeakable. And sickened, he drew back. 

It was never related to the girl Francesca, when she 
had grown mature enough to have the confidence of her 
father, what happened to drive Liborio out of Italy, 
whether he had sinned against Society and the State till 
even the power of the Camorra could no more protect 
him, or whether he had come to be considered a danger¬ 
ous rival by the ringleaders of the organization. What¬ 
ever it was, Liborio found it convenient and judicious to 
leave Naples between two suns, never to return. As a 
matter of course, Aniello went with him. 

They had a little money between them, not much, 
but enough to bring them to New York and set them 
up in a small way of business as second-hand dealers on 
the lower East Side. They prospered, and speedily grew 
out of those dingy and drab beginnings into their antique 
business of fair repute on Madison Avenue. But they 
did not outgrow the Camorra or outdistance its influence. 
In this world one does not do that, unless one seeks out 
some spot where there are no Italians of Neapolitan 
blood or connections. Even so, one is never safe; the 
arm of the Camorra is long, its memory even longer; its 
apostates are singularly few, this side of the grave. 

In New York the brothers found themselves in the 
second Italian city of the world, a city whose population 
boasted a large element of Neapolitan origin with a flour¬ 
ishing overseas branch of the Society of Camorra, 
scarcely less powerful in its sphere of influence and activ¬ 
ity, if measurably more discreet in the application of its 
power, than the parent body. 

In America, indeed, the name Camorra was little used, 
the Society was content to pass loosely as the “Black 


104 


BAROQUE 


Hand”; and if many of its crimes were attributed to its 
sister society of Sicily, the Mafia, it endured such injus¬ 
tice without complaint. 

Liboro in his new life, so far as Francesca knew, made 
no effort to keep clear of the toils of those associations 
which had made him a virtual outlaw from Italy; but— 
as if experience had really taught him something—was 
sedulous to take no hand in the administration of the 
Camorra in America, was content passively to play its 
supple servant. And it is probable that the business of 
Baroque Brothers profited heavily thereby, from its very 
beginnings. Francesca was satisfied that, even in its 
earliest phase, the firm had served the local Camorristi as 
a thieves’ fence. 

Though this was against the will of Aniello, he was wise 
enough not to remonstrate with Liborio outside the walls 
of their home. And if bitter quarrels grew out of 
Liborio’s persistence in holding to his criminal courses, 
this last was not one to betray to the Camorra the infi¬ 
delity of his brother. He knew what would happen should 
Aniello become suspect, and had no wish to prove that the 
ancient Italian superstition about twins dying in the same 
hour would hold good in an alien land. 

The last bond of sympathy between the brothers was 
severed when they fell in love with the same woman. 
She chose Aniello; and though they continued to live 
under the same roof the old affection was gone forever, 
only that curious psychic rapport remained which made 
the twins ill at ease when denied each other’s company 
for any length of time. 

By degrees Aniello retired from active participation in 
the management of the antique business, leaving every¬ 
thing to Liborio, who withdrew more and more into the 
shop as into a shell, till he even slept there, on a make¬ 
shift bed behind a screen, and saw his brother’s family 
only at meal times. But Francesca remembered how, if 
Aniello failed to visit the shop in the course of any morn- 


BAROQUE 


105 


ing or afternoon, Liborio would come moodily prowling 
through the house till he found his brother and made sure 
all was well with him; whereupon, as a rule, he would 
return without exchanging a word with Aniello. 

It was subsequent to her father’s marriage, or Fran¬ 
cesca was mistaken, that Liborio began to make the shop 
a general depot for the receipt and distribution of drugs 
smuggled from Italy by colleagues in the Camorra. 

The futile protests which Aniello uttered against this 
practice served only to widen the estrangement. Liborio 
only sneered, serenely continued in his chosen way. And 
Aniello could do nothing but await the fall of the in¬ 
evitable. 

He was so sure it was merely a question of time before 
exposure would bring down retribution that (he once 
told Francesca) he was relieved when Death took from 
him the wife whom he had loved with a reverence ap¬ 
proaching adoration. At the worst, she was spared the 
disgrace that was sure to come, and the pain of learning 
that her husband had all his life long been the brother of 
a criminal and an associate of criminals. 

She died without ever knowing the least doubt of 
Aniello’s uprightness. 

Angelo had long since betrayed the “baroque” cast. 
From childhood his temper had been ungovernable, its 
manifestations vicious. After his mother’s death he began 
openly to seek evil associations; no one in the family had 
any influence over him, Aniello least of all. Francesca he 
respected in some measure, because she had the gift of 
seeing through him, of reading his mind—especially when 
its content was not such as he was desirous of sharing. 
He grew to hate the girl for that. 

When at length his bias for the society of his kind 
brought him into contact with members of the American 
Camorra, and he learned of his uncle’s complicity in its 
affairs, it was Francesca who divined the course of his 
thoughts and learned what he strove frantically to hide 


106 


BAROQUE 


from her, that Angelo had offered himself to the Society 
as a novice, a picciotto ’i sgarro. 

To advance from this grade one must be guilty of some 
act of signal service to the Camorra, such as the murder 
of one of its enemies or one whom it has marked down for 
slaughter for a stipulated fee. 

When in the horror excited by her discovery the girl 
cried out, threatening to denounce him to her father, 
Angelo without hesitation launched himself at her throat, 
intending her death. 

Unquestionably, since he was armed and insane with 
rage, he would have consummated his purpose had it not 
been for the intervention of Aniello and Rodney Man- 
ship. 

“I knew then,” Francesca said, ‘‘he would visit disaster 
upon us all. But not in what fashion . . .” 

For a moment she held a melancholy silence. 


XVIII 


T N the code of the Camorra there is one crime for 
A which the only and certain punishment is death— 
’nfamita, treason to the order. For the police spy or paid 
informer who worms his way into its confidence it knows 
no mercy, much less for the member who betrays a com¬ 
rade in either greed or revenge. 

“Only a Cammorista could have given the information 
that led to the raid,” said Francesca. “There were many 
besides Angelo who knew, many who, for all I know, 
hated my uncle and father and wished their ruin. As for 
Angelo, he knew they kept all their money in one bank, in 
my father’s name. So when father drew his will, he 
willed not only his own property but everything Uncle 
Liborio had to leave—of course, with his approval. There¬ 
fore Angelo knew that Uncle Liborio must have consented 
to a will that to all intents disinherited him. He had other 
reasons for hating him, too . . . 

“But whether or not it should turn out that the traitor 
was my own brother, my vow bound me, I had to go 
on ... to the end.” 

Her plans were all made when she left America for 
England, she knew what she intended to the final detail. 

“Do you remember, Rodney, that night at the Chatham, 
when you wanted me to fight the will and I refused, giv¬ 
ing as my reason that not to contest it would be to lull 
the enemy into a false sense of security? It was for the 
same reason I went to England. I knew I’d be—perhaps 
not followed but—spied upon; and that, when it was 
reported I had opened up my house in London and settled 
down, apparently content, they—the enemy, whoever they 

107 


108 


BAROQUE 


might be—would think I had given up and forgotten. 
But Angela—if it was Angelo—should have known me 
better.” 

“I’m not sure he even knew where you were. That 
shyster, Croce, tried to worm your address out of me, 
but of course failed.” 

“Still, I’m sure they found out ultimately. I was on 
the qui vive, you know, and there was enough proof that 
I was being watched all through those first few months 
in London. I had to wait till they got tired of it before I 
dared do anything. But I moved quickly then, I promise 
you.” 

She made no secret of her destination when finally she 
did leave London to become Madame Farusi’s guest at 
her villa in Florence. If she were to be followed, Fran¬ 
cesca wanted to know it; and the best way to make sure 
was to leave a broad and open trail for the guidance of 
whomsoever might choose to be concerned. But her most 
jealous watchfulness detected no sign of a gratuitous 
shadow en route, and after a quiet week in Florence she 
was satisfied that the surveillance of which she had been 
conscious in London had been dropped—or had failed, it 
might be, through simple discouragement, having found 
so little to reward it. 

“Still I don’t know what I should have done without 
Nella Farusi. She was so sweet and sympathetic, when¬ 
ever I was at a loss she knew just what ought to be done, 
whenever I was discouraged she gave me new heart.” 

“You mean to say Madame Farusi approved—!” 

“There’d be another story to tell if she hadn’t. You 
see, Rodney, she herself was born in Naples, she lost a 
brother through the Camorra, she knows what it means 
and hates it as my father hated it—as I hate it!” 

And so, in the bleak of one still, clear dawn, Madame 
Farusi might have been (but fortunately for her reputa¬ 
tion wasn’t) seen to leave the villa and enter her motor¬ 
car under the gallant escort of a young man, slenderly 


BAROQUE 


109 


elegant of figure even in his cloak, who might very well 
have been Angelo Baroque on his best behaviour—or> 
rather, on better than his known best. And Florence saw 
neither of them more. 

Under cover of darkness, the previous night, Fran¬ 
cesca’s nurse Marcella had slipped away upon an inde¬ 
pendent errand, concerning which she had been furnished 
with explicit instructions. A shrewd old thing, not un¬ 
intelligent, dependable, active for all her years, hopelessly 
devoted to her mistress, and no lover of Angelo . . . 

Madame Farusi and her interesting young companion 
were at pains so to time their motor tour as to enter 
Naples after dark. Thus it happened that their chauffeur, 
unacquainted with the city, wandered from the beaten 
track. He found it again quickly enough; but the fugitive 
glimpses of mean side streets by night, with their formi¬ 
cating life, which constituted Francesca’s first impressions 
of the cradle of her forebears, caused the elation, the 
sense of coming courageously to grips with adventurous 
fortune, which had been welling fitfully in her bosom for 
the last few days, to give place to misgivings and vague 
alarm. Not without excuse: the impact of Naples au 
natural upon sensitive and unprepared perceptions must 
be staggering, when it isn’t sickening. 

On arriving at their hotel, Francesca locked herself 
into her room in a state of mind not remotely resembling 
panic. She had been on the road since earliest morning' 
and was desperately tired, yet could not sleep. From her 
pillow she could see through a window a stain like blood 
in the sky, the baleful halo of Vesuvius. From the streets 
rose a rumour, swelling and fainting, like the gnarl of a 
beast at once sluggish and bloodthirsty. Against her will 
she was revisited by memories of what she had already 
seen of stark poverty, squalour, and disease; and re¬ 
minded that she had as yet but skirted the outer fringes, 
of that terrible, strange city, she shuddered and was; 
afraid. 


110 


BAROQUE 


She began dimly to comprehend that crime and the 
Camorra were the natural spawn of such conditions. 

“I am sure,” she told Rodney, “if I had been brought 
up in such an environment, I too must have turned out 
'baroque/ ” 

Since it was no part of her plan to risk recognition and 
exposure of her impersonation through any mischance, 
however unlikely, she made believe to be indisposed, the 
following day, and kept to her room. Madame Farusi it 
was who fared abroad and kept a clandestine rendezvous 
with the faithful Marcella, bringing back such informa¬ 
tion as was essential. 

It was weary waiting for Francesca, alone there in a 
strange hotel in a strange city, alone with her faint hopes 
and her fears that hourly gained strength and waxed in 
stature. The prospects revealed by the windows did 
little to distract or soothe away her apprehensions. Even 
in that vast, enveloping brilliance of sunlight, even under 
that immaculate, dense sky of matchless blue, she thought 
to detect a sense of something sinister in the aspect of 
the city, in the way its congeries of dwellings spread and 
sprawled over hillsides and ridges, lifting up terrace upon 
terrace like many-windowed cliffs whose ledges and crev¬ 
ices sprouted living green—something anomalous in the 
serene beauty of the bay, something ominous and mina¬ 
tory in the far-flung profile of Vesuvius with its grim 
convolutions of smoke writhing up to soil the heavens. 

Nor did the kaleidoscopic ferment of those sidewalks 
which her windows overlooked help to dissipate the sense 
of unreality or mitigate the illusion of a city of living 
death, a city spellbound in portentous suspense, waiting 
dumbly in the impotence of black enchantment against 
the crack of doom . . . 

Evening brought back Madame Farusi with word that 
every arrangement had been made. They dined quietly, 
then settled to wear out another long while of waiting. 
At length it was dark. Madame Farusi kissed Francesca 


BAROQUE 


111 


good-bye and pressed upon her an automatic pistol. The 
girl in her dress of a man went downstairs and left the 
hotel. 

Outside its doors she was set upon by a milling swarm 
of beggars, touts, and self-styled guides. She paused in 
dismay, bewildered by that nightmare ring of swarthy 
faces with rolling eyes and gleaming teeth, deafened by 
vociferous solicitations, importuned by insatiable, claw¬ 
ing, pawing hands. Then through the thick one fought 
his way, leaving a wake of sore ribs and trodden toes, 
pursued by groans and imprecations. 

A tall and brawny creature with an open countenance, 
the look of a genial animal and the swagger of a bravo; 
Francesca remarked that, though all cursed him, not one 
offered to resent his brutality in kind. As he came on he 
continued without ceasing to offer himself as a guide; and 
in the tumultuous stream of his speech a certain phrase, 
not in itself noteworthy or out of character, recurred 
again and again. Francesca signified her acceptance of 
his services. 

At once he took charge of her and, turning on the rab¬ 
ble, assailed it with furious gestures and foul squalls of 
vilification. It gave way sullenly, growling, snarling, 
heaping maledictions upon his head. Grasping Francesca’s 
arm above the elbow her guide hurried her round the first 
corner into a dark and narrow alley. Here he checked, 
made sure they were clear of eavesdroppers, and tersely 
enquired: 

“The name, signor?” 

“Barocco.” 

“Come, then. You are awaited. Let us not waste time. 
He does not like to be kept waiting.” 

As if it no longer mattered to him whether his charge 
followed or not, he plunged away through the shadows 
at a gruelling gait. More than once Francesca had to 
break into a trot to catch up, but never once did he 
slacken pace or look back to see how she was standing it. 


112 


BAROQUE 


In less than two minutes the girl had lost all sense o£ 
direction in the wanderings of a labyrinth of dark by¬ 
ways, all narrow, tortuous, and walled in by tall rookeries 
to whose forbidding facades iron balconies festooned with 
bedding clung like fungoid growths. 

By twists and turns and doublings, under arches, 
through tunnel-like passages, up flights of stone steps 
short and long—interminable they often seemed to Fran¬ 
cesca, labouring at the heels of her guide—the two fled 
like hunted things; and always they were climbing. There 
was, indeed, ironic paradox to be read in the circumstance 
that the higher the ground they traversed the lower the 
character of the quarter—one in which (Francesca was 
well aware) the life of a stranger would be worth not a 
minute’s purchase save by favour of the Camorra. 

In those vile channels life alternately ran in brawling 
rapids or churned slowly, like scum on a sullen back¬ 
water; but fluent or stagnant in all seeming grew ever 
more exuberant, less reticent, and noisier. 

Here unglazed windows and doors open to the street 
disclosed frankly to the passerby domestic interiors like 
drawings in black-and-white gouache, cluttered rooms 
whose shadows crowded jealously oases of dull light shed 
by smoking lamps, and in which whole families slept, 
ate, fought, loved, bred and died, all with the completest 
absence of self-consciousness. 

One’s ears knew no respite from the slurring sibilance 
of the Neapolitan vernacular, twanging and buzzing of 
stringed instruments, scuffle of bare feet and clatter of 
shoes upon the stones, snatches of unseemly songs . . . 

Hither and yon curious lights flared and faded, repel¬ 
lent shadows lurked, out of them strange faces peered 
and leered like masks of imbecility and sin spewed up 
from the vilest deep of the Pit . . . 

Panting and stumbling, Francesca had begun almost 
to believe that this weird flight would never know an end, 
when her guide halted before a door at the end of a blind 


BAROQUE 113 

alley, knuckled it loudly, and sang in a full barytone a 
stave of popular song. 

There was a wait. He eyed Francesca with a smile of 
contempt. 

“Blown, signor? A brave picciott’ you’ll make!” 

She said nothing to this, and he held a grinning silence 
until the door swung noiselessly open, admitting them to 
a long, arched passageway, paved with stone. This led 
them into the dark, still courtyard of a venerable palazzo, 
whose lightless windows stared down upon a silent foun¬ 
tain, patches of brown earth that had once been flower¬ 
beds, flagged walks in whose cracks grass grew thick and 
long. With a sign bidding the girl to wait, her guide lost 
himself in the thick darkness beneath a gallery that ran 
round the four sides of the court. 

He was gone so long that she began to be uneasy; but 
at length he reappeared in one of the arches of the gal¬ 
lery, beckoning with his head. She followed, to be wel¬ 
comed by a door that opened of a sudden, letting out a 
warm flood of light. Blinking, she found herself in a 
room wide and deep and little less bare than the cell of 
an anchorite. 

There was no rug on the tessellated floor; neither pic¬ 
tures nor draperies broke the monotony of whitewashed 
walls; for all furniture, a vast old bed plainly dressed, a 
table almost as large on which were a lamp, writing mate¬ 
rials, and books, a washstand, a bookcase, two common 
chairs, and a third on wheels. 

The door closed behind Francesca; she was alone with 
the tenant of the wheeled chair. 

He sat quite stirless, with hands like bleached claws of 
a bird folded in his lap; an old, old man, his physical 
insignificance of younger years today pathetically wasted 
and crippled by disease; dressed in a heavy woollen gown, 
with a white neckerchief knotted round his throat, a plain 
rug over his knees. Perhaps because of the extreme 
emaciation of his body, his head seemed abnormally large, 


114 


BAROQUE 


but it was finely modelled, as were the features over which 
the skin was taut and colourless with that utter absence 
of colour which one associates with things that have never 
known sunlight. Only the eyebrows were jet black and 
the eyes beneath them black and of extraordinary fire 
and intelligence. 

The unwinking stare of those uncanny eyes seemed to 
bore Francesca through and through. She felt suddenly 
a little faint and giddy with fright. How should she hope 
to deceive this one, this creature of evil who, despite his 
hopeless decrepitude, had for nearly half a century by 
sheer force of mind alone held command of the Society 
of Camorra and directed its destiny with inflexible will 
and unfailing cunning? 


XIX 

L, 

Tj'RANCESCA retained enough presence of mind to of¬ 
fer the indispensable salute of profound veneration; 
and the short-lived respite of that moment when her head 
was bowed and the spell of those relentlessly skeptical 
eyes was broken, enabled the girl to reanimate her sinking 
heart with the reminder that she stood now at a pass of 
mortal significance, where flawless address and audacity 
alone could save her. One little hint of the qualms with 
which she was inwardly a-quake would be fatal: she had 
ventured too far into the arcana of the Mala Vita to hope 
to escape if found wanting in any way but most of all 
in point of courage. 

So, her act of homage punctiliously performed, she 
lifted her head high to look down boldly upon that shape 
of strange immobility in the wheeled chair, at once tol¬ 
erating and challenging its persistent and cynical regard. 

For several seconds (they seemed as many long-drawn 
minutes) nothing rewarded her, not so much as the trem¬ 
bling of an eyelash modified the impassivity of the man in 
the chair. Only the sardonic intelligence that informed 
his eyes flawed the illusion of a figure fashioned of wax. 

At length, however, as if despairing of the attempt to 
wear down her patience, that head of a diabolical patriarch 
in its frame of snowy hair was almost imperceptibly in¬ 
clined, heavy eyelids instantaneously curtained those dis- 
concerting eyes, a voice as coldly metallic as the sound 
of a steel bell issued from cruel and pallid lips: 

“Come nearer.” 

The girl complied without hesitation, and when she 
stood before the chair heard another word—“Kneel!”— 
and dropped upon a knee. A hand like a talon was prof- 

115 


116 


BAROQUE 


fered. She took it on finger tips and pressed her lips to 
its back. An invincible shiver rippled down her spine, 
for it was as if she kissed something less than living 
flesh, something icy with the grave’s eternal cold. 

“Arise.” 

She got up. The man in the chair lifted his gaze to her 
face, but finding the angle of vision difficult, with a flirt 
of the hand in which there was a hint of temper, required 
her to stand back. Completely docile, she retreated a few 
paces, till another sign bade her pause. 

“Your name?” 

“Francesco Barocco.” 

The wraith of a mordant smile writhed the thin and 
bloodless lips, and the girl felt herself transfixed by a 
pang of pure fear. Did he then already suspect—? 

“Barocco: I know that name.” 

“Who of Naples does not?” 

The brilliant eyes clouded. “Th A re were two brothers, 
I believe,” the man said with a faintly satiric inflexion. 
“If I am not in error, they emigrated to America many 
years ago.” 

“My father and uncle.” 

“Yes?” A slight lift of the heavy black eyebrows lent 
this a supercilious accent. “Which was which ?” 

“My father’s name was Aniello, my uncle’s—” 

“I remember: Liborio. A bold soul, over-bold at times, 
not always prudent, not always discreet.” 

Francesca loosed an arrow into the air. 

“One was confident you would not have forgotten.” 

A faint stress on the pronoun you earned her a hawk¬ 
like glance of suspicion so strong that it nearly resembled 
alarm. So her arrow had found a chink in the armour! 
She wondered where. If only she knew! But the shot 
had been wholly at random . . . 

“And these old friends—I might almost call them my 
brothers—they are well, I trust, and prosperous?” 

“They are dead, si masto.” 


BAROQUE 


117 


“Dead!” 

“They died at the same time, months ago.” 

The old head nodded thoughtfully. “It would have 
been like that with them. As memory serves, they were 
twins.” 

“Like my brother and myself.” 

“You have a brother, then?” 

“His name is Angelo.” 

“Your father had no other children?” 

“Only Angelo and me, si masto.” 

“But your uncle—?” 

“My uncle never married.” 

“Ah, yes—yes.” The man in the chair was watching 
her intently, and she was again conscious of the faint 
suggestion of his derisive smile. “And is your brother 
much like you, since you are twins ?” 

“Very,” she contrived to reply, feeling as if her knees 
were water. 

“And do I understand that you have come from Amer¬ 
ica to see me ?” 

“Yes, si masto.” 

“It is a far journey . . . Why?” 

Francesca obliquely replied: “Some time before his 
death my father told me of a friend whom he had had in 
Naples, a dear friend whom he had been fortunate 
enough to do a great service.” 

“He had a name, I presume, this famous friend?” 

“Si masto, his first name was the same as my father’s. 
For that reason they always called each other brother. 
The name was Aniello Ansiello.” 

“I remember,” said the old man, nodding—“I knew 
that one, too.” 

“He rose to a high place, si masto, a very high place ; 
he became Supreme Master of the Honourable Society 
of Camorra.” 

“But then, as I recall, he died.” 

“He disappeared,” Francesca corrected gravely. “He 


118 


BAROQUE 


had made himself so powerful that the Italian Govern¬ 
ment itself came to fear him. He disappeared, and an¬ 
other took his place as Supreme Master. But it is said 
he did not die, and his successors were mere marionettes 
that moved only when Aniello Ansiello manipulated the 
strings.” 

“A fanciful tale, Francesco Barocco.” 

“Perhaps, si masto.” 

“But if you seek this Aniello Ansiello, your father’s 
friend, I regret I can be of no service to you.” 

“I am not so sure,” Francesca contended coolly. “There 
was a certain ring . . .” 

The folded hands upon the rug stirred and unclosed; 
in the palm of one lay an old-fashioned signet ring, an 
onyx intaglio in a setting of gold exquisitely wrought. 

“That ring,” said Francesca. 

“What of it?” 

“But for it I should not be here talking to you, si masto. 
I sent it to you by another hand with my petition for this 
audience. The ring was my father’s. Aniello Ansiello 
gave it him in earnest of his gratitude and his promise 
to serve him in turn to the full of his power if ever my 
father were in need of assistance or protection—‘either 
you or your children/ were the words of Aniello Ansiello 
as my father repeated them to me. I have come from 
America to ask the redemption of that promise.” 

“But since Aniello Ansiello is no more, why do you 
apply to me?” 

“That pledge was given in the name of the Camorra by 
its Supreme Master. It is a matter of the honour of the 
Honourable Society, not of the man. Aside from that,” 
Francesca pointedly added, “you are not dead, si masto.” 

“That is true,” the old man admitted without betraying 
any resentment of her boldness—“in a sense I am not 
dead. But”:—the wasted hands lifted suddenly, fluttering 
like dead leaves, in a passion of despair—“is it a life I 
live, and for thirty years have lived, confined to this chair. 


BAROQUE 


119 


penned within these four walls? What are friends or 
enemies to one in such a plight as mine ? Shades of dead 
yesterdays. What is a promise uttered many years ago? 
Ghosts of dead words that beat without meaning on my 
ears.” 

But that seizure of emotion swiftly passed. The hands 
fell and were again folded in a form of resignation upon 
the rug, the brittle voice resumed: “What is it you re¬ 
quire, then, of the Honourable Society?” 

“Let it redeem its promise to the dead by permitting 
me to serve it.” 

“You!” 

Of a sudden a horrible thing happened, something 
whose horror in her understanding passed Francesca’s 
ability to portray: the creature in the chair laughed aloud, 
a spasm of malicious mirth laid hold of him and shook 
him bodily, shook discordant cackles out of him as one 
might shake cracked dice from a cup. 

More frightened than affronted, the girl shrank back 
with a movement of dismay and repugnance uncontrolla¬ 
ble ; and this seemed to bring the other to his senses, for 
his unholy derision choked in full peal, and in a twinkling 
he was as he had been, motionless and calm with a show 
of deadly calm denied only the ironic glimmer of his eyes. 

“So you would serve the Camorra?” Francesca made a 
sound of assent. “May one enquire in what way?” 

With a great effort the girl made herself articulate. 

“There is treason—’nfamita—at work among those who 
call themselves good Camorristi in America. This de¬ 
mands to be run down and exposed.” 

The shrewd, bright eyes narrowed intently. 

“Explain.” 

As briefly as she might Francesca narrated the story 
of the raid upon the antique shop of Baroque Brothers. 

“Treachery alone did that,” she concluded; “through 
treachery the Camorra has lost a source of great revenue— 
and I my father and uncle. With the Camorra ’nfamita 


120 BAROQUE 

calls for punishment; with me, si masto, blood cries aloud 
for blood.” 

“But the Camorra, I think, may be trusted to cleanse 
its honour in its own time and way.” 

“Nevertheless, it will not wisely refuse one who has so 
powerful a motive for serving it faithfully and well in 
this affair.” 

“Possibly. But you could have served it without com¬ 
ing to Naples, one might argue.” 

“Before I can accomplish anything, it is necessary that 
I be accepted as a good Camorrista; before that can be, 
I must have your countenance, si masto. In America my 
suspicions are known to the guilty, they will not have me 
of their number lest I unmask them. But with your 
sanction . . . Furthermore, you alone can remit the 
term of my novitiate. If I must serve one year as 
picciotto d’honore and three more as piciotto di sgarra— 
what shall I hope to find out in New York four years 
hence ?” 

“That is the least of your difficulties. There are others, 
two others of major importance to be dealt with. The 
law of the Camorra may never be suspended in this 
respect, that he who would become a Camorrista in full 
standing must first prove himself a man of heart and 
worthy of such honour by some act of courage and devo¬ 
tion to the Honourable Society.” 

Francesca contrived to cover a shudder with a shrug. 
Too well she knew what was meant. 

“I am ready, si masto. Only tell me what I must do.” 

“That is not so easy to decide off-hand. But it is an 
obligation not to be forgotten, even if it be possible to 
circumvent the greater difficulty.” 

Francesca found her mouth so dry she could hardly 
form the words: “And that, si masto—?” 

She saw the shadowy and mocking smile reillumine the 
astute eyes. 

“The Camorra does not admit women to membership.” 


BAROQUE 


121 


The girl uttered a cry of dismay, and began to tremble. 

“You knew !” she stammered. “You have known all 
along!” 

The man assented with a deliberate nod. 

“Did you think to cheat Aniello Ansiello? But the 
dead know everything!” 

She cast about wildly, contemplating flight, and he put 
an end to that. 

“Be at ease. You shall never escape without my con¬ 
sent.” 

In terror she sank upon her knees, offering clasped 
hands of pitiful suppliance. The smile of scorn deepened 
the lines of the pallid mask that looked down upon her, a 
wave of negligent fingers bade her rise. 

“Have I said that you ask the impossible? But no: 
it can be arranged—and shall, if you continue of the same 
mind.” 

She could only stare, dumb in incredulity. The man 
was turning the ring over and over in his palm. 

“A promise is a promise,” he mused aloud; “not even 
the dead may evade the obligations they assumed in life. 
What is it to me if to grant this request is to send you 
to your death? Shall a dead man hold the laws of the 
Camorra m,ore sacred than his pledged word? If Aniello 
Barocco had not done Aniello Ansiello a great service, 
Aniello Ansiello might never have become Supreme Mas¬ 
ter of the Honourable Society and its slave, a living 
corpse condemned to this living tomb. Shall I forgive 
that act of friendship which made me what you see and 
break my word to save the children of my friend? Listen 
to me, my girl: The Camorra is already tottering. This 
spirit alone”—he tapped his bosom—“holds it together. 
A little, and I shall be no more. Then the Honourable 
Society will go down in ruin. Do I owe it so much for 
making me what I am, that I must hesitate to speed its 
disintegration ?” 


122 


BAROQUE 


He laughed again, and the insanity of his merriment 
chilled the heart of the girl. 

“It shall be as you wish. Only I tell you—and remem¬ 
ber, the dead know the future—you shall gain your end 
only at cost of your life.” 

He rang a little silver bell that stood upon the edge of 
the table, convenient to his hand. 

“Go now: return to your hotel. Discreet arrange¬ 
ments will be made and communicated to you in due 
course. And be patient: the Camorra of Aniello Ansiello 
will not fail to make good its pledge.” 

Francesca grew conscious of a cold draft upon the 
back of her neck. The door behind her had opened 
noiselessly, upon its threshold her guide stood leering. 
The creature in the wheeled chair dropped his head, 
signifying that the audience was at an end. She turned 
and stumbled out. 

As the door closed she looked fearfully overshoulder, 
and had her last glimpse of the Supreme Master of the 
Camorra. 

Stirless, he sat gazing into space, the black eyes, blank 
and lightless, staring fixedly as if awaiting the office of 
some kindly hand to close them. Upon his blanched and 
ascetic countenance a curious, ghastly smile was hovering, 
like a shade of evil made manifest. 


# 


XX 


'VT OT till she found herself delivered from the oppres- 
sion of that goblin intelligence which, from the 
invalid chair of decrepitude, from the bare cell of death 
in life, ruled over the Camorra of Naples with the iron 
authority of a demogorgon, did Francesca begin to appre¬ 
ciate how desperate had been the pitch of nervous tension 
to which she had been keyed against and throughout her 
hour of audience. 

Reaction left her so enervated in body and mind that, 
as she crossed the dark, still courtyard with her guide, 
she was dully conscious of wavering footsteps and, com¬ 
ing to the silent marble fountain, was fain to stop and 
rest a little upon its lichened coping. 

“Wait!” she quavered. 

The Camorrista paused in staring annoyance. 

“What’s wrong ?” he growled. “Why, you’re trembling 
like a woman! One would think you’d failed to pass.” 

“Pass—?” she echoed witlessly. 

“He made no sign,” the man replied testily. “Other¬ 
wise you would be tasting cold steel this very minute. 
What do you think, then? Is it likely the Old One would 
let a rejected candidate go free to betray him? . . . 
Though the good God knows what use he can have for 
such as you!” 

He spat in contempt, but in the next breath seemed to 
perceive some signal of which Francesca was unaware 
and, in a ferocious mutter bidding her stop where she 
was, bounded away to lose himself in the darkness be¬ 
neath the gallery. 

Glad of the respite, Francesca threw back her head and, 

123 


124 


BAROQUE 


looking up to the rectangle of star-stippled sky framed by 
the inner walls of the palazzo, filled her lungs again and 
again with the sweet breath of night, feeling as if she 
were washing them clean of the effluvia of a tomb. 

A measure of composure returned to her, she ceased 
to tremble, but her mind was all a-crawl with fears like 
snakes in a thicket. 

To this extremity she had come in pursuit of her vow 
of vengeance, that she stood committed to the execution 
of some nameless act of infamy at the will of that mon¬ 
strous genius whose presence she had just quitted! 

Nor dared she harbour hope of evading her self- 
assumed obligation to give proof in deeds of her fitness 
to become a member of the Honourable Society of Ca- 
morra; however hideous the task the malicious ingenuity 
of its Supreme Master might devise, she might not even 
so much as demur—to refuse would be sheer self- 
destruction. 

Stung to sharp action by this tardy perception of the 
plight into which her infatuation had led her, Francesca 
jumped up and cast about for the mouth of the passage¬ 
way to the street, thinking of nothing but flight, reckless 
of consequences. 

Perhaps fortunately, that impulse stirred too late; she 
had no more than left her seat upon the coping of the 
fountain when, to her blank dismay, she found her guide 
before her, bowing and smirking in a change of attitude 
so entire that she could only gape in amaze. And then, 
before she knew what he was about, the man had caught 
her in his arms, embraced her affectionately, and printed 
an ardent kiss on each of her cheeks. 

But she found herself free again before she could 
muster her wits to resent the indignity; the hands she 
raised to thrust the fellow away barely brushed his bosom 
as, scraping and grinning, he fell back. 

“You beast!” she stormed furiously. “What the devil 
do you mean— ?” 


BAROQUE 


125 


The Camorrista rounded the shoulders of humility and 
sawed the air with deprecating hands. 

“But the accolade, O little comrade! the accolade. 
Must you be angry with me if, having learned from the 
Old One himself what honour he has in store for you, I 
make haste to salute you with the kiss of confraternity?” 

The walls of the ancient courtyard mocked in ghostly 
hisses his half-whispered explanations, while Francesca 
collected herself sufficiently to comprehend the inference 
implicit, that the “Old One”;—that stricken spider who 
waited back there, motionless in his lonely web of death— 
really meant to keep faith and make easy her acceptance 
by the Camorra. 

“Basta !” she silenced the man—“enough! You took me 
by surprise. I did not understand at first. It is no 
matter. Let us go.” 

Invisible in the gloom of the passageway, someone was 
waiting to let them out; and when they had passed 
through to the street Francesca heard the muffled clank 
of iron bars falling into their sockets on the inside of the 
door. A sound to make one shudder . . . 

“Come!” she cried, nervously imperative—“hasten, it 
is late!” 

And indeed, by the comparative quiet of the ways they 
threaded, it was later than she had imagined, she had 
been closeted with the “Old One” longer than she guessed. 
Streets that earlier had been fluent with the restless flux 
and reflux of a population largely homeless now wore the 
semblance of vast bivouacs cluttered with bodies of those 
who slept, with the charming abandon of the Italian va¬ 
grant, where sleep had overtaken them, sprawling in the 
gutter with a crooked arm for a pillow, semi-recumbent 
in the angle of a wall, or curled upon the sidewalk with 
head upon a doorstep. And where a myriad voices had 
been clamorous in love and hate and drunkenness, in 
melody and blasphemy, there was now snoring on every 
hand, a nocturne in barbarous dissonances infrequently 


126 


BAROQUE 


punctuated by hushed calls, moaning cries, or, more 
rarely still, muted snatches of song. 

Unto these last, Francesca observed, her companion 
seemed to lend an ever heedful ear as he padded at her 
elbow, now and again mumbling a word or two of advice 
as to the next turning, or phrases of flattery and fawning. 
For whatever the wraith of Aniello Ansiello had said to 
this one, it had worked an agreeable improvement in his 
manners, reducing him to a deference approaching ser¬ 
vility; and where he had before led at the top of his 
speed and left Francesca to follow as best she might or 
be damned to her, he was now content to pace obse¬ 
quiously by her side, only occasionally ranging on ahead 
a few yards to spy out the way, as if to make sure it was 
quite safe for his charge. 

Perhaps he had received a warning of some sort, while 
waiting for her to finish her interview with the “Old 
One,” to give him substantial grounds for misgivings; or 
it may have been simple premonition that weighed upon 
his spirits . . . 

They were still far from the hotel, by Francesca’s dead 
reckoning, still inextricably ensnarled in the matted by¬ 
ways of that gloomy slum, when of a sudden, approach¬ 
ing a blind corner, the man stopped, grasped her wrist 
with a peremptory hand and, growling an imprecation, 
stiffened like a jungle beast at first wind of danger. 

Startled, the girl questioned fearfully the shadows that 
surrounded them, but saw none that moved, and listened 
acutely, but heard only the forlorn mewing of an invisible 
cat, lost and hungry in the night. 

“What is it?” she breathed, unsuccessfully twisting her 
imprisoned wrist. 

“Silence!” the man hissed. “Attention!” 

Still she heard nothing but the complaint of the cat, 
and presently even that was hushed. 

With another oath the Camorrista shifted his hold to 
her upper arm and, dragging Francesca with him, began 


BAROQUE 


127 


to run back the way they had come, but within a dozen 
yards or so stopped short in mid-stride and again stood 
tensely poised in alarm. 

Somewhere on ahead, the unseen cat was mewing again; 
and when its voice fell Francesca heard a man’s, near at 
hand, a melting tenor softly singing a phrase of an old, 
old song she had heard her uncle hum a thousand times 
in days dead and gone: 

“Oi ne’, trasteve, ca chiora!” 

And if one needed proof that this was a warning cue 
of the Camorra, Francesca had it in the wrench her arm 
suffered as her guide again wheeled about and broke into 
a run. 

‘‘What is it?” she cried over and over, stumbling on 
the cobbles as she tried to emulate the lope of the Camor- 
rista. “What has happened? Tell me—please!” 

But the man might have been ignorant of Italian for 
all the attention he gave her more than inhered in that 
vice-like clutch of her arm, whose flesh was to bear the 
prints of his fingers for many a day to come. 

They were once more at the turning when from the 
black mouth of a nearby doorway a dark shape darted, a 
cloak flapping from its shoulders like wings of some 
monstrous bird of prey, and with incredible fury flew at 
Francesca’s guide. Out of the corner of an eye the latter 
saw his danger; and thrusting the girl aside, swung with 
a yelp of rage to receive the assault. 

They came together with a shock that sent each reeling 
back, but instantly closed in again, grappled and went 
down into the kennel, where they fought like maniacs, 
locked in each other’s arms, indistinguishable one from 
the other, a blurred bulk that heaved and flopped and 
writhed—and then, abruptly, to the sound of a deep 
groan, ceased. 

An affair of seconds, it was over so quickly that Fran¬ 
cesca had not stirred from the spot where she had checked 


128 


BAROQUE 


on being thrown aside, when she saw her Camorrista 
rising from the body of his assailant. 

He was breathing heavily, and by the dim light of a 
distant street lamp the girl could see his features work¬ 
ing, his eyes rolling like those of a maddened animal; but 
he seemed to be unharmed, and when, in stupidity of 
horror, she gasped “What have you done?” she heard 
him give a sound between a grunt and a laugh, and saw 
in the palm of a hand which he thrust before her eyes 
the haft of a knife whose blade had snapped off short. 

From that too eloquent testimony, as much as from the 
thing that had been slain at her feet, the girl cowered 
back, sickened. But now again the cat was mewing, and 
the man threw back a startled head and searched the 
shadows on every hand, while from a distance the tenor 
in a minor wail iterated the caution against foul weather: 

“Oi ne’, trasteve, ca choir a!” 

Whatever the crime which had won him his place in 
the ranks of the Camorra and the trust of the “Old One” 
as well, the guide proved not wanting in courage. His 
comment on the repetition of the warning was prefaced 
by a grim chuckle, as he stepped nearer to Francesca. 

“More ? But they are gluttons, don’t you think ? Here: 
have you got a weapon of any sort, you? Give it me— 
quickly!” 

With no definite notion of what she was doing, the girl 
dragged from a pocket Nella Farusi’s pistol, and per¬ 
mitted the man to snatch it away. 

“Ah-h!” he snarled exultantly. “Now we shall see—” 

The mewing of the cat here became a discordant 
squawk that silenced the words on his lips; and catching 
Francesca’s wrist a second time, the man dragged her 
round the corner. . . . 

What happened then was never clear to her; even 
when lapse of time rendered it possible for her to hark 
back to that passage with some approximation of calm, 
it was all a nightmarish muddle in her memory. 


BAROQUE 


129 


Shouts, a vision of several men bearing down on her 
and her companion as they swung into the next street, 
pistol shots, a personal collision with one whom she 
somehow managed to throw off and who failed to return 
to the attack, more shots, vivid flashes of orange and gold 
stabbing the night, shrieks that curdled her very soul, an 
instantaneous impression of one who ran weaving and 
faltering like a drunkard, then collapsed and did not rise 
again . . . 

She came to herself standing with back to a wall, 
hands clipping her cheeks, a cry bubbling in her throat, 
wide and dilate eyes photographing permanently upon 
the tablets of her memory a tableau of terror: 

Across the street a number of little lamps, burning with¬ 
out flicker in the still night air, created a space of lurid 
colour in the dark, casting up into theatrical illumination 
an open shrine, a deep niche in a wall sheltering a crucifix 
with the pale, emaciated figure of the tortured Christ half 
life-size and coloured with frightful realism, blood welling 
from the wounds, a bloody sweat upon the face of agony. 
At the foot of the crucifix, votive offerings of flowers, 
withered and fresh. Below the shrine, seated sideways 
on the cobbles, a shoulder and his head resting against the 
wall, the Camorrista who had been her guide, dying. In 
the kennel in the middle of the street another man, motion¬ 
less, a huddle of clothing like an ill-packed sack. Several 
yards away, a third unstirring shape . . . 


XXI 


T HAVE simply no recollection whatever of getting 
back to the hotel that night,” Francesca assured 
Rodney Manship. “I remember running over to the 
wounded man, my guide; but there wasn’t anything I 
could do for him, he had been simply riddled by bullets. 
I took his head on my knees, and he tried to tell me 
something, I couldn’t make out what; but I think he 
wanted me to leave him and save myself, for with the last 
of his strength he managed to lift the pistol and put it, 
still hot and reeking, into my hand. Then he turned his 
head away and quietly died. 

“All the while there were voices all round us, shouting 
and screaming, and people running about. Somebody, 
some man, caught hold of my sleeve and tugged at it, 
urging me to get up. I remember putting the head of 
the dead man down on the cobbles, and rising . . . 

“The next thing was waking up in my room at the 
hotel, with Nella Farusi bending over and shaking me. 
I fancy I felt as a drug addict must when he comes back 
to his senses, heavy and sick; I couldn’t think connectedly 
and didn’t seem to want to, probably on account of that 
horror hiding just under the surface of consciousness, 
waiting for me to recall it. Instinctively I must have been 
afraid of remembering. Aside from that, I didn’t know 
where I was, at first, or how I’d got there, and I didn’t 
recognize Nella Farusi immediately. Poor dear! she was 
half frantic. 

“She had lain awake half the night, reading and waiting 
for me to come back. She says it was hard to keep her 
mind on what she was reading, because of worrying; most 

130 


BAROQUE 


131 


of the time she just lay there, listening for my footsteps; 
and then she fell asleep and didn’t hear me come in, and 
when she woke up it was broad daylight. She jumped 
out of bed, ran into my room, and found me lying across 
the foot of my bed, still dressed in my man’s clothes, with 
the pistol on the counterpane, where I’d dropped it, I 
presume. I was sleeping so heavily, it took minutes to 
wake me. 

“As it turned out, it was lucky for me it happened like 
that; for if Nella had been awake when I came in she 
would have put me to bed, of course, and I wouldn’t 
have been presentable to receive early callers, especially 
when they didn’t give me any time to prepare myself, but 
walked in on us without taking the trouble to knock, and 
shut and locked the door behind them.” 

She was finishing breakfast in the sitting-room she 
shared with Nella Farusi when that happened—if it’s 
fair to dignify with the name of breakfast so sorry a 
pretext for a meal, a few mouthfuls of roll, a few swal¬ 
lows of coffee choked down because Nella Farusi insisted 
Francesca must eat to keep up her strength. 

They were making futile and panicky efforts to decide 
what to do, which way to fly, when the two men walked 
in on them. One was a porter employed by the hotel, a 
sturdy, broad-shouldered rogue with a fetching smile and 
the homely, open countenance of the honest man that he 
was not. The other was a tolerably imposing presence, a 
person of urbane middle-age with the port of a senator 
and the dress of a member of the diplomatic corps, from 
polished silk hat to spotless white spats—attire so formal 
that, considered in relation to the portentously grave 
countenance he wore, it satisfied Francesca at sight she 
had now to face nothing less than arrest for participation 
in that tragic brawl in the night. 

Her consternation struck her dumb and immobile, save 
that those dark eyes widened in a face whose pallor grew 
more intense as she rose; and this stricken calm must 


132 BAROQUE 

have passed for the composure of callousness in the sight 
of the two men. 

Nella Farusi got up, too, with a startled exclamation 
half-smothered by knuckles pressed to her lips. 

“What—what do you want?” she demanded tremu¬ 
lously, since Francesca said nothing. “What right have 
you— ?” 

“Pardon, Madame Farusi,” said the gentleman in the 
white spats with a bow that would have graced the court 
of his king, a deep bend from the hips with the silk hat 
held over his heart. “It is of urgent necessity that I 
speak alone for a few moments with Signor Francesco 
Barocco.” 

Francesca found her voice again. “I am Francesco 
Barocco,” she said with a steadiness that surprised her. 
“What do you want with me?” 

“Signor!” Another bow of profound respect. “If 
Madame Farusi will be so gracious . . .” 

A sweeping gesture consigned the precious hat, and 
the ebony stick that went with it, to the porter, who rever¬ 
ently deposited them in a safe place, while their owner 
strode impressively to the door that communicated with 
Nella Farusi’s bedchamber, opened it, and executed yet 
still another of his overpowering bows. 

“For a few minutes only, madame.” 

Madame Farusi consulted Francesca with a look and, 
when the girl inclined her head slightly, took it for 
granted that she was in full command of herself, and 
left the room. 

Her disappearance was the signal for an amazing 
demonstration. His face aglow with admiration and 
enthusiasm, the porter threw himself upon Francesca’s 
neck, embraced her, saluted her cheeks with the twin 
kisses of the accolade, and then with immense solemnity 
bestowed a third upon her forehead. 

“O honoured and heroic youth!” he gurgled in ecstacy 
-“O brother!”-and stepping aside, surrendered 




BAROQUE 


133 


Francesca to like treatment at the hands and lips of the 
stranger of distinguished appearance. 

It was too much. She was overcome and faint with 
the relief from first fears, and at the same time stupid 
with astonishment, incapable either of understanding the 
reason for such proofs of respect and affection from 
that ill-assorted pair of strangers or of acknowledging 
them in any adequate manner. So she remained un¬ 
responsive while they fawned upon her, pawed her, and 
sang her praises in a sort of antiphonal chant, first one, 
then the other taking up the tale of her courage, prowess, 
and eminent qualifications for enrollment in the hierarchy 
of the Camorra. 

But gradually the meaning of it all began to become 
apparent, she grasped and gasped at perception of the 
fact that these two conceived her to have been responsible 
for the three out of the four murders which her guide 
had done, before being slaughtered in his turn, in that 
street affray. 

The gloom of ill-lighted ways together with the sud¬ 
denness and the confusion that had marked the affair 
were in part responsible for that, but even more the 
reputation of her guide. It transpired that the fellow 
had been a notorious bravo and duellist of the Honour¬ 
able Society, but a true Camorrista who had remained 
loyal to its deadly trinity of steel, the settesoldi, the ’o 
zumpafuosso, and the triangolo, holding in contempt 
devotees of the modern school of the automatic pistol 
and the bomb. 

Only a fortnight earlier, Francesca learned, his arrest 
had been decreed by authority so exalted that even the 
Camorra could not influence it. Nevertheless, insolently 
confident that his popular prestige would preserve for 
him the immunity he had so long enjoyed, he had con¬ 
tinued to go openly about his affairs and to rely, if 
worst came to worst, upon his really formidable ability 
with the knife. 


134 


BAROQUE 


Its work upon the body of his first assailant had been 
reckoned unmistakable; but since he had never been known 
to use a firearm, Francesca, found with the man’s head on 
her knees and a fuming pistol in her hand, was credited 
with having slain three out of the four Carabinieri who 
had been specially commissioned to take their man dead 
or alive. 

And now no less a personage than a delegate of the 
Publica Securezza of Naples, himself a prominent Camor- 
rista elegante, had come in company with the capo 
paranze of the Camorra in that quarter, to felicitate the 
girl upon her service to the Honourable Society, inform 
her of her promotion to its highest rank (such was the 
significance of the kiss upon the forehead) convey to her 
the gratification of the “Old One,” and arrange for her 
immediate departure from Naples and from Italy as 
well. 

The affair had created no end of a furore, she was 
assured, already the Government of Italy itself was 
rumbling ominously. The Camorra would need to go 
warily till the wind of public indignation changed. Thus 
far nothing was known outside the Honourable Society 
as to the identity of the youth who had fought so nobly 
in defense of the dead Camorrista; but one could never 
tell what might leak out. It would be injudicious in the 
extreme for Francesca to delay her flight by so much as 
a day, even for so important a ceremony as her ritualistic 
initiation. That not only could but must wait till her 
arrival in New York. But she would be given letters to 
insure her a cordial reception there. 

“The Dante Alighieri sails from Genoa day after to¬ 
morrow,” the delegato informed the girl. “You would 
do well to be aboard her. Reservation will be made for 
you in any name you choose, signor. I would not hesi¬ 
tate to counsel you to sail in disguise—but it would be 
convenient, on the other hand, if you could only use your 
American passport.” 


BAROQUE 


135 


“Leave that to me,” Francesca replied promptly. By 
this time she had recovered sufficiently to command an 
air of deep guile. “I know how to arrange matters with 
the American consul at Genoa. As for the disguise,” 
she added innocently, “I think I might pass very well 
as a girl—don’t you?” 


XXII 


T N less than six hours’ time Naples had become a 
hideous nightmare of iniquity and terror that, like a 
vast storm-cloud, inky and louring, lurked just down the 
southern horizon from which the Farusi motor-car was 
madly racing through the sun-drenched beauty of Cam¬ 
panian hills. 

It could not move too swiftly, too great a space could 
not be put between her and that city of abominable 
night. Yet Francesca knew neither distance nor remorse 
would ever serve to free her soul from the bondage of 
that lothly incubus into which she had sold it. She saw 
herself a lost woman. 

She could never forget, dared not if she could—for the 
Camorra would not. Never again might she hold herself 
wholly her own mistress so long as, back there in Naples, 
in that forbidding palazzo in the black heart of that 
hideous quarter, he lived on, that “Old One” who shared 
her secret and who had bought all her freedom of will 
and thought and action at the meagre cost of his com¬ 
plaisance. Henceforward his word and wish would be 
her only law, or she must walk all her days in fear, know¬ 
ing that at any moment retribution might be meted out 
to her, that justice of the Camorra in which mercy has 
never any part. 

Neither was the girl any way comforted when she saw 
Italy take on the semblance of a purple cloud upon the face 
of the waters, a mist that dwindled, faded, grew more 
tenuous, and vanished astern, as the Dante Alighieri 
rolled out from Genoa into the Mediterranean. For if 

136 


BAROQUE 


137 


she was leaving behind the land where the Camorra had 
generated and gained its rankest growth, she was bound 
for another whose soil had proved only too hospitable 
to the transplanted seeds of its vicious doctrines. 

It was anything but a pleasant voyage for Francesca. 
She was for the first time in months without a confidant, 
Madame Farusi having said farewell to her in Genoa, 
while Marcella had gone on by rail to Cherbourg to catch 
a faster boat; due to arrive in New York three days 
before Francesca, the servant was fully instructed as to 
the arrangements she must make. 

So the girl, if once more herself in name and dress, 
was without distractions, restless and ill at ease in mental 
and spiritual isolation. She made few acquaintances on 
shipboard and cultivated none, devoted too much time to 
melancholy brooding and introspection, and recognized 
nothing cheerful in all the world until, one fine morn¬ 
ing, from the deck of the steamship trudging up the 
Bay, she saw the storied peaks and pinnacles of Man¬ 
hattan lifting up out of iridiscent haze across the blue, 
the city of a dream at dawn, and learned how beautiful 
it is to come home to one’s own people after far wander¬ 
ings in exile. 

In the course of the next few days a young man began 
to be noticed in Little Italy, going modestly to and fro 
with a light of eager curiosity in his eyes, an amiable and 
well-favoured youth, not at all averse to making friends, 
who gave his name as Luigi Barocco and claimed close 
cousinship with the Neapolitan family of that name. 
Unquestionably there was a resemblance . . . 

To the inquisitive he related that he had lived most of 
his life with his parents, the proprietors of an Italian 
restaurant in London; but they had recently died, and 
Luigi, journeying to Naples to rejoin his kinsfolk, had 
become the victim of misfortune (he did not care to be 
more specific) which had rendered advisable his emigra¬ 
tion to America. He was not without means, but frugal 


138 


BAROQUE 


after his kind and, having fallen in with an ancient aunt 
several stages removed, was for the time being quartered 
with her in a common two-room tenement flat. And who 
of Italy should think the worse of him for that? 

As for the question of making a living, he was in no 
hurry, his plans were at present nebulous, he purposed 
taking his time to look round and acquaint himself with 
conditions in this weird new world before dedicating his 
talents definitely to any specific line of endeavour. Of 
course, if anything promising were to present itself im¬ 
mediately, as something might at almost any time, since 
he was armed with letters of introduction to several 
influential gentlemen of Italian birth resident in New 
York, men of honour every one . . . 

The term was not lightly used, in admiration or by 
way of flattery; it meant more than the mere surface of 
the words conveyed, especially to ears of Neapolitan 
education. The Society of Camorra countenances no 
resignations from its ranks, but it looks indulgently upon 
those who have vision enough to perceive that respect¬ 
ability pays; so not infrequently the “man of heart” 
who ranged the streets of Naples ready for any mischief 
becomes a “man of honour” when he takes out naturaliza¬ 
tion papers in America, takes no more active part in the 
afifairs of the Honourable Society, devotes his energies 
to the task of building up a good social and a solid busi¬ 
ness reputation, keeps a close mouth, and serves old 
associations only passively for the most part, while re¬ 
maining always subject to the call of the Camorra in 
time of need or stress. 

Aniello Barocco, for example, had turned “man of 
honour” even before leaving Naples; and it is probable 
that his brother Liborio had fostered designs upon that 
estate in his American beginnings. 

Luigi Barocco, the newly landed, presented his letters 
all in a single day; and in every instance they earned 
him a welcome of gratifying warmth. 


BAROQUE 


139 


Admirably simple letters they were, in point of 
phraseology, cunningly worded as to convey little or 
nothing to one familiar with the Italian language but ig¬ 
norant of the extensive use of metaphor in the cant 
of the Camorra. Francesca herself had been not a little 
perplexed by this seeming innocence of expression, un¬ 
able to understand how the letters could be as inform¬ 
ative and persuasive as they must to serve her ends. 
But she had not long to wait to learn that they told more 
than they pretended to. “To be kissed by strange men is 
no longer any novelty to me,” she told Rodney demurely 
—“on the cheeks and forehead, at least.” 

And it was surprising how quickly her fame as a 
“man of heart” got about in Little Italy. The reputed 
destroyer of Carabinieri remarked that she was hailed 
with effusive warmth by the few who had already come 
to know her, as she walked home to her tenement lodg¬ 
ing that evening, and that utter strangers more often 
than not saw fit to salute her with respect or give her the 
sidewalk when they passed. And she had just sat down 
to supper with Marcella when a knock introduced the 
favourite picciott’ of the local capo maestra, an ingratiat¬ 
ing young assassin with the face of a rat and a lithe, 
sinewy body closely encased in store clothes of extreme 
cut and violent colouring. 

His boss, he announced, desired ardently to make the 
acquaintance of the redoubtable personage who had been 
living so unpretentiously in the Italian colony for sev¬ 
eral days. If Luigi Borocco would take the trouble to 
be at home at ten o’clock that night, one would call to 
conduct him to the customary place of meeting. 

Francesca promised to be waiting at the hour ap¬ 
pointed, and returned to her interrupted meal, but had 
no appetite to finish it. Now that she drew near the 
goal of her long and arduous endeavours, she found her¬ 
self a prey to unmasterable agitation, torn this way and 
that by hopes and fears. 


140 


BAROQUE 


All this while she had seen nothing of Angelo, heard 
nothing of him save in the way of casual comment upon 
her likeness to her “cousin,” a resemblance which she 
had been at pains to modify as much as possible, not 
without fair success. It really wasn’t a difficult matter 
to avoid Angelo’s personal tricks of speech and gesture, 
his slouching grace of carriage and normally petulant 
expression, the temper alternately sullen and domineering 
which coloured his personality with a certain, unmistak¬ 
able, and ugly distinction. For the less she was reported 
to be like him, if gossip about Luigi Barocco were com¬ 
municated to Angelo, the less likely he was to become 
suspicious and make it his business to find out for him¬ 
self about this newcomer from Naples. 

Indeed, Francesca insisted, it had never entered her 
head to impersonate her brother till the uproar in the 
hallway led her to open the door and see Rodney being 
trampled to death by that pack of murderous piccotti. 

“But I knew then,” she said, “I had been wrong in 
assuming Angelo had not made himself a power in Little 
Italy. You would never have been attacked, I felt sure, 
except by his orders. I couldn’t doubt he had been 
watching the house when he saw you enter it and had 
given the word not to let you leave it alive. So I knew 
only Angelo could save you. It seemed hardly probable 
that they’d accept me as Angelo, seeing me come out of 
Luigi’s flat, but it was worth trying and—I couldn’t 
think of anything else. So it was with my very best 
imitation of Angelo that I interfered, and—it worked. 

“Not till afterwards did I remember that, if Angelo 
had been watching the house, it must have been for a 
purpose with which you hadn’t anything to do, because 
you had come there by the sheerest accident. In other 
words, it must have been me whom Angelo was watch¬ 
ing. And how long had he been doing that ? And why ? 
Why hadn’t he come to see me and have it out ? 


BAROQUE 


141 


“Knowing as I did how quickly he goes half out of 
his mind when he’s frightened about himself, how irre¬ 
sponsible he is at such times, I don’t mind admitting I 
was in a blue funk. I know now how a mouse feels when 
a cat is playing with it.” 


XXIII 


PpRANCESCA paused to study Rodney’s face for a 
** moment, her brows knitted in half-humourous ap¬ 
prehensiveness, in her eyes a twinkle of mischief in¬ 
genious and speculative. 

“You little know,” she resumed, “how narrowly you 
escaped being kissed tonight, when that taxi stopped! 
But if you’ll take my word for it, Rodney, you had a 
very close call. . . . But only,” she amended in haste, 
as the young man sat up sharply—“only out of self-pity 
and—if you must know—the shamefullest cowardice.” 

Rodney sank back with a rueful laugh. “Might’ve 
known there’d be a catch in it somewhere,” he com¬ 
plained. “It sounded too good to be true—it was.” 

“But I was so wretchedly scared and sorry for my¬ 
self,” the girl protested. “And I didn’t dare let you see, 
or even suspect, or you’d never have let me go back 
alone, I shouldn’t have been able to go to that meeting, 
all my intriguing, the labour and worry of months, every¬ 
thing would have gone for nothing. So I simply had 
to deceive you, Rodney, screw my courage up to the last 
notch, put a bold face on it, pretend there was really 
nothing afoot you could reasonably fret about. And 
that made me feel so frightfully noble and Spartan, you 
know, I could have howled in appreciation of the heroic 
figure I was cutting, going forth to meet my fate, what¬ 
ever it might be, with a spirited toss of the head and a 
brave smile on my young lips, when I wanted nothing 
so much as to be held back by a masterful hand and— 
and be made a fuss over. . . . What with vanity and 
imagination always at work in us, it’s a wonder we’re 
not greater idiots than we are:—isn’t it, Rodney?” 

142 


BAROQUE 


143 


“There’s only one living being can call you an idiot 
in my hearing and get away with it.” 

“But when I do, you’ll agree?” 

“Well!” Rodney submitted, “it isn’t manners to con¬ 
tradict a lady. And besides, you ought to know best. 
You knew what you were going to do, when you insisted 
on leaving me, this evening—I didn’t.” 

“Neither did I, really. I had an inkling, of course; 
but if I’d guessed precisely what was in store, I don’t 
believe I’d have had the nerve to go through with it.” 

The encounter with Rodney and the troublesome prob¬ 
lems it provided, of how to get him out of harm’s way 
and cheat his jealous solicitude, had so delayed the girl 
that she got back to her tenement lodging via the back¬ 
yards and fire-escape (praying fervently she had not 
been noticed in her furtive passage through the streets) 
in time to be 'welcomed by impatient knocking at the 
hall-door. Nor could she guess how long that had been 
going on; judged by its tempo, more than a few 
minutes ... 

Thanking her stars for the foresight which had in¬ 
structed Marcella not to return to the flat before mid¬ 
night, Francesca hastily slipped out of her coat and low 
shoes, tore off collar and necktie, lay down on the bed— 
which, as she had foreseen it would, remonstrated with 
loud squeaks—and promptly got up again. Then she 
unlocked the hall-door and presented a drowsy face to 
three who were waiting there, the picciotto whose ac¬ 
quaintance she had made earlier in the evening, and two 
others of his kind—wiry, corrupt and deadly types of 
the Italo-American Camorristi, “gangsters” or “gunmen” 
in the vocabulary of police reporters. 

Her heart quaked with dread inspired by the obvious 
significance of this veritable guard of honour, when she 
had expected only the picciotto for her guide. Ap¬ 
parently her impersonation of Angelo had served for the 
time being only; she told herself she had been a fool 


144 


BAROQUE 


ever to have hoped for better luck. Now she was clearly 
suspect. And if she clung to any doubt as to that, she 
had the look of the picciotto to undeceive her, the malice 
and distrust that glimmered in his slotted little eyes and 
curled back his upper lip from two projecting yellow 
teeth. 

“What t’ell’s th’ matter wid youse? We must of been 
knockin’ fi’ minutes. Where yuh been anyway?” 

“Asleep—just now waked up.” 

The mouth of a rat was twisted by a skeptical sneer. 

“Uh-huh. I guess that’s a hot one, too. Where’s the 
guy yuh pulled in here a while ago? What yuh done 
with him?” 

“Why!” said Francesca pleasantly, as she turned back 
and lighted the gas, “he’s gone, a good while ago. What 
about it?” 

The three gangsters shouldered into the room, and 
one closed the door while Francesca nonchalantly sat 
down on the edge of the bed and pulled on her shoes 
again, looking up with an amiable, enquiring smile. 

“Aw! nothin’—only you got some tall explainin’ to do 
to the patron—” 

“The capo maestra?” 

“Uh-huh—why yuh butted in and what yuh done with 
that bird he wanted beat’ up.” 

“Well,” said Francesca coolly, rising and donning col¬ 
lar and tie: “I daresay I can satisfy him, if it comes to 
that.” Sometimes it was a bit difficult to remember 
that Luigi Barocco had learned his English in London 
and knew nothing of the dialect of New York’s East 
Side; one had to watch one’s tongue carefully. “How 
could I know he was interested in that man—the capo 
maestra? Nobody told me anything, and I haven’t been 
in this country long enough to know all your faces by 
heart. I thought they were Mafiusi, those boys who were 
beating the man. As for the man, I mistook him for 
one who had been friendly with me on the steamer, 


BAROQUE 


145 


coming over. When I found I was wrong, he begged on 
his knees to be let out the back way, so I showed him 
the fire-escape—and got this for doing it.” 

She displayed an exultant grin and a sizable roll of 
bills. 

“Anyway, I don’t believe you, or the capo maestra 
either, will see that man in this neighbourhood soon 
again. If you ask me, he’s had enough. If I hadn’t 
interfered when I did, he’d have been killed.” 

She shrugged into her coat and pulled her cap down 
over one eye. The picciotto had an incredulous grin. 

“Maybe the boss ’ll swallow it, the way you tell it,” 
he; doubted. “I’m glad it aint me has got to spill it to 
him.” 

Francesca lifted a negligent shoulder. 

“After all, it’s my affair, not yours, isn’t it? Ready?” 

They went out. 

In the streets two of her escort kept close to her elbows, 
while the picciotto walked behind: an arrangement that 
told the girl clearly enough she could consider herself 
virtually under arrest, a prisoner of the Camorra pro¬ 
ceeding under guard to the place of judgment. The 
taciturnity of those two between whom she walked was 
in itself enough to prove she was in deep disfavour with 
the Honourable Society to which their allegiance was 
pledged. To her tentative overtures they returned grunts 
or monosyllables, of their own initiative they ventured 
nothing. If it was necessary to instruct her as to a turn¬ 
ing, she received a nudge of the shoulder from the guard 
on the offside, nothing more. But she didn’t mind, the 
strengthening of the story she had fabricated to satisfy 
her companions gave her enough to think about. 

A longish walk, something more than a mile by her 
reckoning, carried them in a southeasterly direction well 
beyond the southern bounds of Little Italy, and brought 
them at length to a quiet block of old brick houses run¬ 
ning down to the East River; a neighbourhood so middle- 


14G 


BAROQUE 


class and decorous that, Francesca noticed, there was 
not another person visible between the avenue corner and 
the iron fence which closed the thoroughfare at its far 
end. Beyond this black water ran sibilant in the stillness, 
tugs hooted like lost souls, the lights of a nondescript ves¬ 
sel could be seen moving slowly toward the Sound; and 
across a vast gap of darkness the street lamps of a Long 
Island community patterned the night like a multitude 
of pinheads, silver and gold, in a drop of black velvet. 

The breath of salt water was strong and sweet. Some¬ 
where a stray cat mewed, and Francesca, remembering 
Naples, shivered. Neither did she find it reassuring 
when another mew sounded close at her heels, and she 
realized that her rear guard was answering a precon¬ 
certed signal; for the first mewing promptly was sus¬ 
pended, and they proceeded in a silence broken only by 
the noise of their own footfalls. 

In front of the very last house on the north side of the 
street the two at her sides fell back, and the picciotto, 
touching Francesca’s elbow, turned in through the area¬ 
way. He had a key to a door of iron grating under 
the stoop, and admitted himself and Francesca to a base¬ 
ment hallway redolent of garlic and lighted by a single 
electric bulb. Then he knocked respectfully on the first 
door and opened it when a strong Italian voice bade 
them enter. 

“I have brought the novice, si masto,” he announced in 
Neapolitan, as Francesca passed through. He followed, 
shut the door, set his back to it, lighted a cigarette. 

In a stuffy little dining room, round a table covered 
with red-and-white chequered cloth, three men sat at 
pause in a game of cards: all types unmistakably of 
Neapolitan or South Italian origin, and all in shirt¬ 
sleeves, otherwise a lot as oddly assorted as could have 
been wished. 

One was a thin, dark, dyspeptic wreck of a man of 
fifty, with a ragged and grizzly moustache, mildly an- 


BAROQUE 


147 


guished eyes, and a ready smile of nervous humility; his 
clothing cynically threadbare. Over across from him sat 
his antipode, a great obese bulk of flesh with a face 
radiantly good-natured—if one overlooked its cruel and 
sensual mouth. 

The third was like neither, but a substantial figure, 
a man strikingly handsome in the Latin style, grave and 
urbane of bearing. A great diamond, like a splinter of the 
sun, shone on one of his little fingers; and every detail of 
his dress was in the key of florid taste humoured by 
wealth. To him the attitude of the others was deferential 
to the last extreme: plainly at least the local capo maestra, 
if not capo intesta of the Camorra in New York . . . 

He was the first to break a fairly long space of silence, 
during which Francesca’s “Luigi Barocco” had to with¬ 
stand the gruelling scrutiny of those three pair of eyes, 
none of which, so far as she was competent to judge, 
showed any sign of bias in her favour. 

At length the question came in Italian, in a voice of 
full tone, well modulated but dispassionate: “You call 
yourself Luigi Barocco?” 

“It is my name, si masto.” 

“How did you get that name?” 

“But naturally—by being born Barocco and christened 
Luigi.” 

“Understand me: I wish precise information concern¬ 
ing your parentage and personal history.” 

“Willingly, si masto.” Obediently Francesca re¬ 
counted the major points of her fictitious biography, with 
some uneasiness observing that the nervous little man 
was jotting down notes in a pocket memorandum-book. 
“But,” she concluded, “all this is no news to you since, 
undoubtedly, you are familiar with the letters from Italy 
which have procured me the honour of this interview.” 

“It is true,” her catechist admitted: “we have seen 
certain letters, otherwise you would not be here. I need 
hardly say to you that only those who have done the 


148 


BAROQUE 


Honourable Society sortie conspicuous service such as 
these letters mention would have been invited to meet us 
here tonight. Nevertheless, Naples is far away, and 
what you did there has little weight with men of heart 
here, where here you have done much, Luigi Barocco, 
to counterbalance the good impression made by the let¬ 
ters you speak of, by interfering in an affair with which 
you had properly no concern.” 

“So I have been given to understand, si masto,” Fran¬ 
cesca replied with a good appearance of regret. “But 
how was I to know?” 

She repeated her specious defense of her conduct in 
rescuing Rodney, throwing in for good measure a few 
persuasive details which had occurred to her on the way 
from the tenement. 

“The man was nothing to me, when I found he was not 
my friend; those who had been beating him were noth¬ 
ing, also. I did not know one face among them all. Cer¬ 
tainly nobody made one sign or sound to tell me it was 
an affair of the Camorra. And when the man I had 
saved offered me money”— she showed the roll of bills 
again—“to get him away safely—why! naturally, I saw 
no reason why I should hesitate to earn my first Ameri¬ 
can dollars. In fact, I thought it a good beginning for 
my life here.” 

She wound up with her most ingratiating smile; but 
the fat man, she noticed, was looking bored, the man of 
nerves was at best not prejudiced in her favour; only 
the spokesman seemed, as from the first, soberly im¬ 
partial. 

“It may be true, what you tell us,” he gave his verdict. 
“At the same time, it is a matter affecting the honour 
of the Camorra less than the personal interests of one 
of our brothers. I mean, it was his private affair you 
interfered with, and you have your peace to make with 
him; if he rejects your explanation, then you must give 
him the satisfaction every-good Camorrista owes another 


BAROQUE 


149 


whom he has wronged or injured, even though uninten¬ 
tionally. Am I right, signori?” 

The question was addressed to the fat man and the 
thin, both of whom hastened to voice hearty endorse¬ 
ment of this just judgment. 

As for Francesca, she knew now she was to see Angelo 
again before the night was over. 

“In the meantime, and in the absence of the comrade 
to whom I have referred”—the speaker consulted an 
ornate watch of platinum, wafer-thin, edged with 
diamonds—“he should have been here an hour ago—I 
see no reason why we should not proceed with the busi¬ 
ness for which we have been called together, according 
to the wishes of the Supreme Master as communicated 
by letter. And you, Luigi Barocco—are you prepared?” 

“I am ready, si masto,” Francesca quietly replied. 

“Then let us proceed. ’Tonio !” 

The picciotto promptly tapped Francesca on the shoul¬ 
der, opened the door, slouched out. 

The girl followed without hesitation, at least with none 
she dared show. Even to herself, for that matter, she 
seemed curiously composed, though the way she trod 
might easily lead to death. One little slip to betray her 
sex must be fatal, since women are debarred from mem¬ 
bership in the Camorra and, should one seek to violate 
this rule and become intimate with its secrets, the as¬ 
sumption is implicit that she is acting as a spy or poten¬ 
tial informer, the punishment swift and sure. 

Or, it might be, Angelo was to prove her undoing. She 
understood that he was expected at any moment. What 
he might say or do when he discovered his sister, in 
masquerade as a man, being initiated into full member¬ 
ship passed Francesca’s powers of prevision. His anger 
she could foresee and discount, but never what outlet it 
might find in action, especially if he were guilty, as she 
feared, of that treachery which had decreed the death 
of their father and uncle. 


150 


BAROQUE 


Terrified, she nevertheless went on without a falter, 
her bearing confident, her thoughts collected. Only she 
noticed a dryness in her mouth, the palms of her hands 
were sweating . . . 

The three who had put her through that perfunctory 
interrogation bringing up the rear, the little procession 
moved to the back of the basement hallway, then down 
a short, dark flight of steps. Here the picciotto stopped 
and rapped. Panels of sheet metal gave sounding re¬ 
sponse. Seven times he knocked, by Francesca’s count, 
with a brief pause between the fourth and fifth strokes. 
Then a door swung on creaking hinges, a wave of dank 
air rolled out, heavy with smell of mould, the picciotto 
announced in dramatic Italian: 

“Signori of the High Council, the Tribunal brings you 
a novice.” 

And docile to a tug at her arm, Francesca passed him 
and entered the cellar. 

Eight men were waiting there, ranged in a wide circle 
round a table in the middle of the bare cement flooring. 
With Francesca and the Tribunal added, the room har¬ 
boured twelve; for the picciotto was not numbered 
among these elect. 

A solitary electric bulb, affixed to si beam and stagily 
shaded with paper of a morbid cerise hue, cast a lurid 
light directly down upon the table; the rest of the room 
and the faces of the High Council were hideous in its 
funereal, purplish penumbra. 

A pair of hands dropped upon Francesca’s shoulders 
from behind and pushed her forward into the brighter 
radius of illumination, then fell away. The door closed 
with a hollow clang, a stillness fell in which Francesca 
grew conscious of a muted lisping and lapping which 
reminded her that the house stood directly upon the 
river, whose waters doubtless washed the foundations 
when the tide was high. 

She scanned in fearful curiosity those countenances 


BAROQUE 


151 


which she could see without turning her head. They 
told her nothing. Angelo’s was not among them; still 
he might be standing behind her, for all she knew. For 
that matter, none of the faces was familiar to her vision, 
though the light was tricky enough to mislead the keen¬ 
est, and recognition, if any had been possible, was made 
more difficult by the fact that each man, as if in obedience 
to some ritual provision, stood with arms folded upon his 
bosom and head bended so that his features were in 
shadow. 

She looked down at the table. Upon its naked deal 
top several objects were laid out, a singular and by no 
means reassuring assortment: a knife of the kind known 
to the Camorra as triangolo, two of the ’o zumpafuosso 
type, a straw-swaddled wine flask, a goblet of chased 
silver, a lancet, an automatic pistol with its magazine 
clip and cartridges disassembled. 

The silence was so prolonged, after the door had 
closed, that the girl, conceiving it to be maintained solely 
with the object of impressing her with the solemnity of 
the occasion, grew impatient, rather, with the silliness, 
the stupidity of it all. Yet she dared not let this be 
seen, she disciplined herself to endure, to ape the stolidity 
of a red Indian, lest the confession of an imperturbability 
less absolute blemish her pretensions to a place in this 
peerage of men of honour and of heart. 

For all that, she could not control a start when, after 
this ordeal of waiting had lasted nearly ten minutes, a 
thunderous knock on the metal door, followed by six 
more, set hollow and inhuman echoes a-bellow. 

Bolts were drawn, there were mutterings at the door, 
inarticulate in her hearing. Then it was made fast once 
more, silence resumed its sway. 

But it no longer mattered to Francesca, no imaginable 
circumstance could have seemed comparable in her under¬ 
standing with the knowledge, which she had just gained, 
without looking, without hearing one familiar accent, but 


152 


BAROQUE 


solely through that sensitive psychic affinity which bound 
their souls together with bonds unbreakable, that her 
brother had come in and taken his place in the circle at 
a point immediately behind her, but so near that he 
could have touched her by stretching out a hand. 

More than this, Francesca knew that Angelo had 
recognized her instantly, in spite of the fact that he 
could not have seen her face, in spite of her disguise. 

Idle the attempt to trick the instinct which had been 
born in them, bred in them as they lay together ere they 
were born . . . that implacable rapport which was none 
the less so strangely destitute of sympathetic affection. 

For, in that brief pause which followed the arrival of 
Angelo, the girl was conscious of his hatred issuing from 
him in great waves of dynamic energy to beat upon and 
envelop her, body and soul, as with ethereal flames of 
malice. 


XXIV 


A VOICE of sonorous timbre, issuing from a source 
which Francesca could not at first locate, with star¬ 
tling abruptness boomed out a question: 

“Name this candidate.” 

In the answer—“Luigi Barocco”—she identified the 
voice of the spokesman of the Tribunal which had re¬ 
ceived her. 

“Name his sponsor.” 

“The Supreme Master of the Honourable Society of 
Camorra.” 

A stir ran round the circle, giving warrant for an 
inference that many of those present had been summoned 
to the meeting without being given specific information 
as to its occasion. 

“What says Supreme Master concerning this can¬ 
didate ?” 

“That he is an orphan, born of parents known to be 
well-disposed toward the Honourable Society; that soon 
after their death in London, this Luigi Barocco repaired 
to Naples to offer himself to the Society; that while 
preparations were being made for his initiation as picci- 
otto d’honore, he distinguished himself by shooting dead 
three out of four Carabinieri who had been charged with 
the arrest of a good Camorrista known to you all, Tobia 
Basile; that in consequence of this signal proof of devo¬ 
tion and zeal, the candidate was constrained to leave 
Naples secretly and in haste; and that in reward there¬ 
for the Supreme Master requires us to receive him into 
full membership here, remitting the customary term of 
probation as novice.” 

“Is there question as to the authenticity of the Master's 
letter ?” 


153 


154 


BAROQUE 


“None. There were in all five letters, all in the same 
tenor and each describing the applicant minutely. Each, 
furthermore, was sealed with the personal seal of the 
Supreme Master himself.” 

“If that is so, and the Council approves, there need be 
no more delay.” 

A murmur of assent was audible. A man came from 
behind Francesca and, placing himself on the far side 
of the table, addressed her directly in the voice which had 
uttered the preliminary questions, a man of no particular 
distinction of person, aside from eyes which, in the 
baleful glow of the cerise-shaded bulb, held a flickering 
glare like shadows of hellfire. 

“Luigi Barocco!” 

“Si masto!” the girl responded. 

“Knowest thou the conditions, what thou must do to 
become as a brother to men of heart and honour?” 

“I am here to be instructed.” 

“Thou must be prepared to endure misfortune upon 
misfortune and to lay down thy life, if need be, that the 
life of a brother may be spared.” 

“I am so prepared.” 

“Thou must hold sacred the secrets of the Camorra— 
and God have mercy upon thee if thou dost traffic with 
spies and traitors!” 

“It is but just that the penalty of ’nfamita should be 
death.” 

“Thou must observe the Omerta and the Frieno, be 
honourable in all thy dealings with thy brethren in the 
Honourable Society and humble toward the High Coun¬ 
cil, obeying without dispute or hesitation all orders, 
though they send thee to thy grave.” 

“I have no ambition higher than this, si masto, to 
honour with my life the Omerta and the Frieno.” 

“Shouldst thou see one, were it thine own father, at¬ 
tack or stab a member of the Honourable Society, thou 
art bound to defend him even though it be at the cost of 


BAROQUE 


155 


slaying thy father—thou shalt own no kinsman closer 
than thy brethren of the Camorra.” 

“The Honourable Society shall be to me as my father 
and my mother, my wife and my children.” 

“Adversity shall be thy lot, and the fear, enmity and 
hatred of all mankind except they be members of the 
Camorra.” 

“Did I fear adversity and hardships, si masto, I should 
not have troubled the Honourable Society.” 

“Should one of thy brethren seek to kill thee, and be 
brought by the police to the bedside where thou best dy¬ 
ing, thou shalt say to his captor: T do not know this 
man.’ ” 

“And if he come alone, then I shall say to him: Tf I 
live, I will kill thee; if I die, I forgive thee.’” 

“Take that pistol, Luigi Barocco—load it.” 

Slowly, that her nerves might not betray her in hands 
of bungling haste, Francesca took up the magazine clip, 
fitted into it the six deadly little cylinders of brass tipped 
with lead, then inserted it into its socket in the grip of 
the weapon. 

“Give it to me.” 

The man with the smouldering eyes took the pistol, 
drew back its slide, simultaneously cocking it and cham¬ 
bering a cartridge, and returned it to the girl. 

“Put it to your head.” 

She dared not demur, she felt the chill mouth of 
metal lip her temple. 

“Pull the trigger!” 

Francesca shut her eyes, that their appeal might not 
be read, and with a silent prayer tightened the pressure 
of her finger on the trigger. The hidden hammer clicked 
upon a dead cartridge . . . 

She heard a subdued rumour of admiration, and re¬ 
opened her eyes with a sense of daze in her relief: she 
had known that it would be thus, and yet . . 

“Put the pistol down, bare your right arm.” 


156 


BAROQUE 


Francesca rolled back her coat sleeve to the elbow, 
then unbuttoned and turned back the cuff to her shirt. 

“Give your arm.” 

She extended it across the table. With the lancet the 
man delicately slitted the skin of the forearm above a 
vein. A few drops of blood welled out and dripped into 
the silver goblet. Then Francesca’s wrist was released, she 
wrapped a handkerchief round it, over the wound, and 
readjusted her cuff and sleeve. 

“Drink,” the inquisitor commanded, offering the gob¬ 
let filled to the brim with wine from the straw-bound 
flask. 

Francesca set the vessel to her lips and returned it. 
The man drank a little of the mixture and gave it back 
to her again. 

“Offer it to each of the brethren in turn,” he enjoined 
her. “If one refuses, thou art rejected by him and must 
fight him.” 

He indicated the brace of deadly duelling knives upon 
the table, the ’o zumpafuossi. 

Strengthened by a belief that the worst was over, Fran¬ 
cesca took the goblet blindly to the nearest Camorrista. 
He sipped and handed it back, and spoke to her by name, 
as Luigi Barocco, calling her comrade. She passed on 
to the next, the next and the next. Angelo was fifth in 
line. 

He seemed strangely remote from her, his twin sister, 
even though scarcely a yard away, strangely a stranger 
in her sight and understanding, as he waited there in a 
stare of hate and fear. 

The hatred in his gaze was undisguisable, his fear 
she divined as she paused before him, proffering the cup 
of blood and wine. His eyes glassy and unwinking, 
sweat standing out upon his forehead, veins in his tem¬ 
ples blue with congestion, his features drawn and set 
in a mirthless grin: Angelo was afraid of her, afraid 
to the very marrow of him. 


BAROQUE 


15T 


He made no move to take the goblet, and Francesca 
was aware, as clearly as if his mind had been her own, 
of the frightful struggle going on in him. 

To refuse would precipitate the duel prescribed by 
inexorable ritual, in which Angelo might be successful in 
so wounding or maiming Francesca that she would be 
forced to abandon her purpose, or at least would remain 
hors de combat long enough to permit him to strengthen 
his defenses or plan some promising counterstroke, some¬ 
thing that would make her hesitate and think, perhaps 
give up altogether. 

On the other hand, a misjudged blow might deal a 
mortal wound, which he dared not risk for the very rea¬ 
son that bound him to refrain from denouncing his sister 
then and there, exposing her imposture: for the reason 
that her death would follow, as night follows day, and 
. . . his twin would not die alone. 

Shaking as with palsy, his hands lifted, took the cup, 
carried it to his lips . . . 


XXV 


ND that’s about all there is to tell,” Francesca an- 



*** nounced, with an unsuccessful effort to snub a 
yawn—“I mean, all worth telling.” 

“Oh, no!” Rodney reproachfully insisted. 

“Well! I can hardly offer more substantial proof of 
my claim that I got away without too much trouble-— 
none at all from Angelo, in fact. I’m not sure,” the 
girl laughed, “I wasn’t a bit disappointed in that precious 
brother of mine; I had looked for more spirit in him, I 
confess. I’m afraid the famous ‘baroque’ strain in the 
Barocci isn’t what it used to be—if it ever was!” 

“But surely the business didn’t end there.” 

“Oh! naturally, I had to go through with a lot more 
nonsense. But I didn’t mind, I’d been too well repaid to 
care. When Angelo took that cup and drank, I knew I 
had nothing more to fear from him, at least for the time 
being. I’d won, I was actually in the Camorra, a full- 
fledged member, free to pry into all its secrets, and not 
even Angelo could say me nay; free to come and go in 
all its haunts without fear; and not only that, but armour¬ 
ed with the assurance that every other Camorrista in 
New York, excepting only Angelo, would come to my 
aid if ever there were any need. The first woman in the 
history of the organization, I suppose . . 

“Good Heavens, what courage!” 

“I wouldn’t call it that,” Francesca objected. “I knew 
how it would be with Angelo, all along, that he wouldn’t 
dare expose me, or attempt anything against me—he 
thinks too much of his own skin. So I don’t see how I 


158 


BAROQUE 


159 


can lay claim to having accomplished anything that called 
for any qualities but cheek and cussedness.” 

“Of course not!” Rodney murmured with sarcastic in¬ 
tention. 

She ignored the interjection. “But if you must know, 
I went on round the circle with the cup; and when it had 
been drained by the twelfth man—he actually seemed to 
like that awful mixture!—I had to go round once again, 
this time to be kissed. And I must say, Rodney, I don’t 
find promiscuous kissing all that’s claimed for it; and 
you’ll admit I’ve had a lot of experience. Think of being 
kissed forty-eight times in a single night.” 

“In Heaven’s name—!” Rodney expostulated. 

“Four times by each man: once on each cheek, the 
accolade; once on the forehead, the kiss of congratula¬ 
tion upon my elevation to full standing; and finally, once 
full on the lips, the kiss of brotherhood. My first ac¬ 
quaintance with that sort; I don’t remember that Angelo 
ever liked me well enough; but I can assure you, Rodney, 
that if I ever should cultivate a whim for caresses, it 
won’t be for the brotherly variety.” 

“You mean to tell me even Angelo—l” 

Francesca nodded vigorously. “Even Angelo; but he 
didn’t perform as if he really cared for the sport. Some 
of the others were perfunctory enough, but Angelo’s 
kisses were the most cynical makeshifts imaginable.” 

“But what did he say?” 

“Not a word. He didn’t have to say anything, for that 
matter; I knew what he was thinking, and he knew I knew. 
And then, as if kissing his own sister had been too much, 
he quietly vanished. The ceremony ended with the 
kissing-bee, and then the others crowded round me, slap¬ 
ped me on the back, offered me wine and cigars, told me 
what a brave fellow I was, and insisted on having the 
full story of my glorious exploit in Naples; and while I 
was busy trying to invent details bloodthirsty enough to 
satisfy them, without giving myself away as a simple 


160 


BAROQUE 


young person who’d never murdered anything but mo¬ 
squitoes—Angelo slipped out when I wasn’t looking.” 

“How soon did you find out—?” 

“Right away. I felt his absence, even if my back was 
turned, just as I had felt his presence when he came in. 
It was some time before I managed to get away, and 
then he wasn’t anywhere to be seen—he had actually 
forfeited the opportunity to waylay me and row and 
bluster! I don’t mind telling you, that was so unlike 
Angelo, it frightened me more than anything, gave me 
furiously to think. I have learned to distrust Angelo’s 
infrequent, amazing exhibitions of self-control; as a rule 
they mean he’s nursing some scheme rather more fiendish 
than usual. It took all my courage to go home alone 
through those strange, midnight streets, where anything 
might happen, and open the door to that wretched hole 
of a flat.” 

“You found your brother there, of course,” Rodney 
prompted as the girl passed into a fit of abstraction. 

“No, I didn’t,” she replied; “and that only made it 
worse. Marcella was waiting up, and when she said 
nobody had been, I knew I had the worst to fear, the 
unforeseeable. And I was so panicky, I fled at once 
by the fire-escape again, and took Marcella with me— 
told her to.go hide herself, and not as she valued life to 
show her face in public till I gave her leave. And then 
I came on here, because I’d promised, but kept careful 
watch all the way to make sure I wasn’t followed. I 
don’t believe there’s any reason for worry, and yet . . 

For a time she sat thoughtfully watching Rodney pace 
the room with nervous strides, frowning at its inoffensive 
rug and running fretful fingers through and through 
his hair. 

“Rodney! what do you think?” 

“Think!” To her infinite dismay the young man stop¬ 
ped suddenly and plumped down on his knees by the side 
of the chair, imprisoning her in it by passing an arm 


BAROQUE 


161 


across its arm. “I think you are the dearest, most won¬ 
derful woman that ever breathed. Incredible—that’s the 
only word that fits you—incredibly brave and sweet and 
—daft!” 

To her look of protest he nodded earnestly, but with a 
whimsical smile, partly impatient, partly indulgent, wholly 
tender. “Yes, daft! The dearest lunatic alive, and never 
more fit for an asylum than now, if you’re flattering your¬ 
self I’ll consent to your going ahead with this craziness, 
to your jeopardizing your life again with criminals who 
wouldn’t hesitate an instant to stick a knife into you if 
they ever dreamed you were a woman. Don’t ask it of 
me, dear—I couldn’t! Twice I’ve let you have your own 
way, when I didn’t know just what you were up to, 
though every instinct warned me I was wrong to trust 
you. But now I do know, it’s out of reason to expect me 
to let you go on and blunder into more risks, greater 
dangers. I can’t, I won’t!” 

“But Rodney!”—she dropped a hand upon his shoul¬ 
der, holding, him at arm’s-length—“what can you do 
about it? If I choose to go my own way, how can you 
stop me? After all, I’m still mistress of my own actions, 
you know—” 

“Still? But you won’t be, not entirely, once we’re 
married.” 

She laughed a little, wagging her head at him. 

“Must I marry you, Rodney?” 

“Yes,” he doggedly said, refusing to be mollified. 

“And give up all my freedom of will? surrender self- 
determination completely to your masterful domination? 
Is that the way you mean to treat your wife, Rodney?” 

“Yes—when her life is at stake.” 

“Do you believe I could love a man who treated me as 
a child, domineered over me, insisted his will must be 
my law?” 

“Y es —if you knew, as you would know, his love for 
you made him risk your anger to save you from harm, 


162 


BAROQUE 


perhaps from death, as the inevitable consequence of this 
vendetta mania. Oh! I love you more than I love life 
itself, but I’ll chance your hatred rather than leave one 
thing undone to save you from yourself in this business.” 

“I could never hate you,” she slowly said, still holding 
herself out of his arms by the hands that grasped his 
shoulders—“I love you too dearly, Rodney, to resent 
anything you could ever do for love of me. And I will 
marry you whenever you like, once my vow is fulfilled. 
But”—the look of fatality seemed to deepen, like a shadow 
cast upon the exquisite face that looked so tenderly into 
his—“you must let me go on, I can’t stop now, I can’t. 
I would if I could, Rodney; but something in my nature, 
something, I presume, handed down to me by ancestors 
to whom a vendetta was a holy thing, won’t let me stop. 
Be patient with me a little; remember I’m at least half a 
woman of another race than yours, a Latin with an in¬ 
heritance of primitive impulses and traditions as alien as 
a Patagonian’s.” 

“Perhaps. Even granting all that, you remain a crea¬ 
ture of reason. What in the name of reason can you hope 
to gain by carrying through this feud which you believe 
is imposed upon you by hereditary instincts stronger than 
your sense of right and wrong, stronger even than your 
love for me? Say you do push this business through to a 
conclusion: that means only one thing, that you’ll have 
to denounce your own brother as a traitor to the Ca- 
rnorra—” 

“You believe that—?” 

“In your heart you know it’s Angelo you’re hunting; 
in your heart you believe it was he who gave the police 
the information that brought about that raid. Don’t you ?” 

“I’m afraid so, but—” 

“Well: say you find the proof you seek. Angelo will 
stick at nothing to stop your mouth. And if he fails— 
what then ?” 


BAROQUE 163 

“The Camorra will deal with him as it has always dealt 
with traitors.” 

“And the blood of your own brother will be upon your 
head.” 

“As the blood of his father and mine is on his!” 

“You don’t know that. You believe it because you have 
been taught that, through the relentless workings of some 
unknown law of nature, twins are fated to die simul¬ 
taneously. You believe, because your uncle was shot in 
a police raid, presumably instigated by your brother’s dis¬ 
loyalty, that your father’s death at the same time was due 
to the same cause. But can you say it wasn’t written your 
father would die when he did, whether his brother died 
or not, from that heart trouble from which he had been a 
sufferer for so many years? Are you prepared to assert 
he would have lived on after that night had there been no 
raid, no excitement, no shock of seeing his brother shot 
down before his eyes?” 

The girl looked away, her head described a slight sign 
of negation. 

“No: you can’t say that,” Rodney pursued. “You can’t 
say you’re not hounding Angelo on to assassination by 
the Camorra for a fault that wasn’t his, a fault that Na¬ 
ture herself planted in your father’s body to be his fate 
at the time he died, whatever the attendant circumstances. 
And even granting Angelo was wholly to blame and you 
are justified in seeking to make sure his punishment—what 
of me ? Have I no standing in your consideration ? Has 
my love for you no rights of its own?” 

She stared, posed. “I don’t understand . . .” 

“Suppose you do find proof that Angelo was responsi¬ 
ble, suppose you do give him up to the justice of the 
Camorra; then Angelo must die. And what of you, his 
twin? Do you hope to survive him, crediting as you do 
the superstition that twins must die in the same hour? 
Have I who love you, then, no right to protest, no reason 
to complain that you value my love so lightly you will 


164 


BAROQUE 


deny it, crown it with despair, rather than forego the 
savage satisfaction of a revenge unworthy of you, no 
matter what the provocation ?” 

Francesca slowly shook her head, her eyes soft with 
unshed tears. 

“Oh, Rodney! what shall I say? You may be right-—I 
don’t know. I want to believe you are right—but ought 
I?” 

“Is it so hard, then, to honour that divine injunction, 
'Vengeance is mine’?” 

Her head dropped, her arms grew slack. He caught 
her to him, crushed her lips with his. She suffered him; 
and presently one of her hands stole upward and round 
his head . . . 



XXVI 


Y OU will marry me?” 

“Yes, O yes!” 

“Tomorrow ?” 

He felt her lips tremble with the monosyllable of as¬ 
sent, but it was withheld. 

“Tomorrow?” he persisted. 

“I don’t know . . 

“Then when?” 

“Very soon. You must let me think.” She moved pur¬ 
posefully in his embrace. “Please, Rodney!” 

He released her and sank back upon his knees, looking 
up to her with eyes of adoration as she made an effort, 
almost pathetic, to recover something of the poise and 
self-command she had lost forever in his arms, some of 
the independence she had ceded to his lips. 

“Oh, Rodney!” she remonstrated, sitting flushed and 
lovely with starlit eyes—“it wasn’t fair to carry me off 
my feet like that. What chance had I, when you added 
the eloquence of a lawyer to the extravagance of a lover? 
It wasn’t kind to take advantage of my being madly in 
love with you at a time when I was faint with fatigue— 
now was it?” 

“But you forgive—?” 

“Do you truly repent ?” 

“Not one whit!” 

“Then of course I forgive you.” 

She bent and swiftly kissed him once, then got upon 
her feet. 

“But now you really must show me a little considera¬ 
tion, dear. I’m so tired I can hardly stand, so sleepy I 
don’t know how I keep my eyes open.” She consulted 

165 


166 BAROQUE 

a nickel-plated watch strapped to her wrist. “Why, it’s 
after three!” 

“Good Heavens!” he cried contritely, rising in turn. 
“I never thought—” 

“Being a man, you wouldn’t. But now you must. 
Please, Rodney, take thought quickly, tell me where to 
go for the rest of the night.” 

“You won’t stir a step from these rooms. Why should 
you? Remember, you yourself pointed out it was emi¬ 
nently proper I should entertain young men of my ac¬ 
quaintance in my rooms after midnight. Besides, I can 
easily hop round the corner to the club and get me a room; 
while you’ll be perfectly comfortable here, and safe. And 
in the morning I’ll drop in for breakfast, if you don’t 
mind, and afterwards we can have a talk and settle 
things.” 

“I don’t know what to say,” the girl demurred, not with 
much conviction. “It doesn’t seem right to turn you out— 
yet I don’t know where else to go.” 

“Don’t tire yourself with worrying about something 
that’s already settled. Sit down a minute while I make 
my room ready and pack up a collar-button.” 

Obediently Francesca subsided into her chair; and 
Rodney marched into his bedchamber, where he turned 
the light up and the bedclothes down, laid out a suit of 
pyjamas, slippers, and a dressing-gown, and hastily stuffed 
a small bag with a few things for his personal use. 

But when he returned to the living-room, it was to find 
Francesca fast asleep in the armchair, so sound asleep 
she did not waken, but only sighed softly, when with 
infinite care he gathered the slight young body into his 
arms, bore it to the adjoining room, and put it down upon 
the bed. 

Then he adjusted the shade of the bedside lamp to 
shield the face of fatality, turned to go, and hesitated, 
gazing in indecision at the stirless figure that rested in 
such sweet abandonment, its every line, for all that dis- 


BAROQUE 


167 


figuring investiture of man’s clothing cheaply smart and 
ready-made, instinct with the unconscious grace and charm 
of a tired child. 

“Oughtn’t to risk waking her,” he mused; “but she 
can’t be comfortable very long, like that.” 

With hands of utmost delicacy he loosened the neck¬ 
tie, freed the slender, round throat from the confining 
collar, unlaced and removed the homely brogues from feet 
whose shapely slenderness should never have been libelled 
by any covering more substantial than silken slippers. 

Satisfied he had done all he might to insure her com¬ 
fort, he stood back, but still lingered, of two minds, doubt 
puckering his brows. 

“No,” he at length decided—“can’t do it, mustn’t leave 
her by herself. Anything might happen, she might wake 
up in a fright about something, and miss me . . .” 

He stole back into the sitting-room, shut the communi¬ 
cating door, took off coat, necktie, collar and shoes, donned 
a dressing-gown over shirt and trousers, thrust his feet 
into travelling slippers, placed a chair so that the rays of 
the study lamp would fall over his left shoulder, filled and 
lighted a pipe, and sat down with the first book that 
offered itself; firmly determined to stay awake the night 
through. 

Never tale was penned by mortal hand that could have 
caught and held his attention in that hour; try as he would 
and did, he could not make his mind grasp the sense of 
the printed text he scanned. Lines blurred and ran to¬ 
gether beneath his dreaming eyes, the pages of the book 
became nothing better than a blank screen upon which, in 
endless succession, burned and faded the wild phantasma¬ 
goria conjured up by the story he had heard from Fran¬ 
cesca’s lips . . . 

Heavy eyelids drooped, then his head; his breathing 
took on a measured tempo; against his will, without his 
knowledge, Rodney slept, and sleeping dreamed a dream, 
a horrible dream, horribly real and incoherent. 


168 


BAROQUE 


He dreamed that he woke up to find himself bound 
and blinded by the dark, helpless in strong and pitiless 
hands that, for all his struggles, held him fast and, lifting 
him up, bore him bodily a long way through the suffo¬ 
cating night to the brink of a pit and cast him down 
therein, into an everlasting pit of blackness fragrant with 
deadly perfume, wherein his body sank and sank, whirling 
giddily, while consciousness grew faint, guttered, and 
winked out like a candle in the wind . . . 

A violent blow of an icy hand brought him back to 
life, a cruel blow above the heart that caused it to start 
and beat in spasms of intolerable pain. 

He found himself standing, clawing empty air, fighting 
for breath like a man at the last moment rescued from 
death by drowning. Then his knees buckled and he would 
have fallen, but was caught and held up by friendly arms. 

With another convulsive effort, Rodney made shift to 
support his own weight again. 

Upon his dazed perceptions impressions beat like break¬ 
ing waves, alternately smothering and subsiding. 

Broad day, sunlight in the windows that made one's 
eyes ache, yet the study lamp and the electric bulbs in the 
sconces garishly aglow . . . 

His head a theatre of throbbing pain, his heart ham¬ 
mering madly against its cage of ribs, each beat a savage 
agony, his mouth dry, hot, and flavoured with bitterness 
as of aloes, the air drawn in by labouring lungs heavy 
with the sickly-sweetish odour of that nightmare pit . . . 

At length, lifting leaden eyes to the face of the man 
who was holding him up, without any emotion he recog¬ 
nized the superintendent of the building in which he had 
his room. 

Then he saw before him Detective Sergeant Ritchey, 
singularly armed with a siphon of seltzer water, his ami¬ 
able and homely countenance overcast with solicitude. 

Ritchey’s voice boomed like distant thunder: 

“That’s done it, Stiles. Feelin’ better, Mr. Manship? 


BAROQUE 


169 


Pretty far gone. Lucky for you we happened in when 
we did, or maybe you’d never’ve waked up in this world 
again.” 

A strangely thick tongue rendered enunciation a busi¬ 
ness of great difficulty. 

“Wha’s—wha’s matter? Wha’s happen’?” 

"‘You’ve been chloroformed; and if you ask me, the bird 
what done it done his damnedest to put you away for 
keeps.” 

The detective set the siphon down, and took from the 
table some rags and a small sponge. 

“You was dead to the world in your chair when Stiles 
here let me in with his pass-key—blindfolded and your 
hands tied with silk handkerchiefs, and this sponge full 
of chloroform held under your nose by a towel wrapped 
round your head. See?” 

For a moment or two Rodney stared with blank and 
witless eyes. Then with a strangled cry—“Francesca!”— 
and an abrupt jerk he broke from the arms of the man 
Stiles, staggered over to the bed-chamber door, and threw 
it open. 

Another cry and a bitter one trembled on his lips. 

The bed-chamber was without a tenant. 

Overwhelmed, he sagged limply against the jamb of the 
door—and Ritchey caught him as his senses failed. 


XXVII 


W HEN Rodney came back a second time from Limbo, 
he was again in the arm-chair, and a young physician 
of his acquaintance, a fellow-tenant of the apartment 
building, was bending over him anxiously, one hand 
taking his pulse, the other holding an empty hypodermic 
syringe. 

“There!” he cried in triumph as he saw intelligence 
begin to dawn anew in the eyes of the patient—“all right 
now, Mr. Manship, nothing more to worry about, bed and 
quiet will do the rest. But you’ve had a close call, would 
have gone West for good if Mr. Ritchey here hadn’t 
known enough to use that siphon.” 

Brain-matter seemed to be so much cotton-wool in 
which thoughts, memories, emotions, all lay bedded, 
struggling feebly but powerless to prevail against that 
shackling inertia. 

Sensations nevertheless registered fitfully; one was by 
turns aware of a heart that laboured painfully, wet gar¬ 
ments that clung clammily to one’s ribs, dull gnawings of 
curiosity . . . 

Rodney managed to articulate just one word: “Si¬ 
phon— ?” 

“You’d been under chloroform so long, you were a 
dead man when they found you, would be still if Mr. 
Ritchey had delayed ripping ofif that towel round your 
head and squirting ice-cold seltzer water on the bare flesh 
above your heart. The shock of that started up the 
paralyzed heart-action, but you fainted soon after coming 
to, so they called me in. I’ve just shot a jolt of strychnine 
into you, and it won’t be long now before you’re as right 
as rain.” * 

170 


BAROQUE 


in 


The physician stood back and nodded to the others. 

“Better carry him in, undress him, and put him to bed 
at once.” 

If his optimism was as specious as that which is com¬ 
monly dealt out to patients, the emergency spurred the 
recuperative powers of a sound constitution; it wasn’t 
as long as might have been expected before Rodney was 
able to put Ritchey into possession of the essential ele¬ 
ments of Francesca’s story—revelations that sadly im¬ 
paired professional imperturbability and in the end lifted 
the detective out of his chair and sent him plodding up 
and down the room with head bowed, a thoughtful frown 
clouding his brows, teeth worrying the inevitably moribund 
cigar-stump. 

“Well!” he confessed, “I’m damned, sure am. I’ve 
heard a heap of fairy tales in my time, some of ’em true, 
too; but this puts the bee on the lot. That girl—!” 

He stood a moment staring at Rodney. 

“Take a henpecked man’s advice, Mr. Manship, and 
don’t never hitch up with one of that kind. A guy might’s 
well spend his married life in a glass bowl, makin’ believe 
he’s a goldfish, for all the show he’s got of keepin’ anythin’ 
to himself with a woman like that.” 

He resumed his march. 

“It all fits in pretty,” he mused, “what you been tellin’ 
me—only some of it’s news. About old Aniello Ansiello 
bein’ alive, f’rinstance. It was one of Joe P'etrosino’s 
pet theories, that bird hadn’t never croaked, but was layin’ 
low somewheres and more a power in the Camorra than 
he’d been in the days when he was makin’ the Eyetalian 
gov’ment eat out of his hand. But I always thought poor 
old Joe was sort of nutty on the subject. Makes me jeal¬ 
ous to think what a goal some Eyetalian bull’s goin’ to 
score on the stren’th of the cable I’ll be sendin’ over 
before I do much else.” 

“Damn Aniello Ansiello!” Rodney interrupted petu¬ 
lantly from his pillow. “He can wait. But Francesca-— 


172 


BAROQUE 


Miss Barocco can’t. If you let anything delay your find¬ 
ing that poor girl and setting her at liberty, Ritchey—!” 

“Don’t get in such a lather. If the little lady’s any¬ 
wheres to be found, I’ll find her; if she’s needin’ help, 
she’ll get it from me quicker’n from anybody else.” 

“/// You know damn well she needs help—” 

“Excuse me, Mr. Manship: I don’t know nothin’ of the 
sort. On the face of it, of course, you’d think whoever 
hopped you in your sleep kidnapped her; but I ain’t by 
no means sure. More I think about it, more it looks to 
me like she lit out on her own, prob’ly before the others 
blew in—if they was anybody but Friend Angelo on the 
job.” 

“What makes you think so?” 

“Why, all the signs ... To begin with, it was half- 
past seven when I called up Headquarters to report, and 
they told me you was tryin’ to get in touch with me last 
night. I got the hunch right away they was somethin’ 
wrong, and beat it around here—couldn’t ’ve taken me 
more’n twenty minutes from where I was. I seen the 
lights burnin’ through the windows, and when you didn’t 
answer my ring I got Stiles to let me in: say in all, ten 
minutes more. As you know, you’d just passed out peace¬ 
ful when we found you, hadn’t been under chloroform 
more’n an hour, if that long. A solid hour of it would kill 
a horse. So it must’ve been round seven you was found 
asleep, bound and blindfolded and given the gas. Funny 
it didn’t wake you up; all you read in novels and papers 
about folks bein’ chloroformed in their sleep and never 
knowin’ what happened is plain bunk. The surest way 
to wake a man up from a sound sleep is to try to put 
him under an anaesthetic.” 

“I did wake up,” Rodney said. “I distinctly remember 
fighting against the hands that held me, and the sickening 
smell of chloroform; but because I couldn’t see, I laid it 
all to nightmare.” 

“That explains that, then. Now at seven o’clock it’d 


BAROQUE 


173 


been daylight sev’ral hours; and able-bodied young ladies, 
like you tell me Miss Barocco is, don’t get carried off 
against their wills, through the streets of New York by 
broad daylight, without causin’ a crowd to collect and 
obstruct traffic. It just can’t be done. Why! if anythin’ 
like that’d happened there’d be fifty eyewitnesses. Not 
only that, but look’t this room. I guess we can safely say 
Miss Barocco wouldn’t let herself be kidnapped without 
stagin’ a fight that'd make the Dempsey-Carpenteeyay 
bout look like a cooked prelim. Notice any symptoms of 
a scrap like that? Besides, no man could have over¬ 
powered her single-handed.” 

“Rather not. But how do we know it was one man 
alone ?” 

“Stands to reason angel-faced Angelo didn’t have any 
help on this job. He wouldn’t dare run the risk of havin’ 
any of his gang find out little sister had been playin’ horse 
with the Camorra. If that ever got out, sister’d be 
croaked, and Angelo would get his simultaneous. At 
least, that’s the way he figures it. . . . Nope; he came 
alone; and when he didn’t find sister, like he’d looked to, 
he got peeved and took it out on you.” 

The detective clamped his teeth firmly on the cigar and 
resumed his plodding walk. 

“But what I can’t understand,” Rodney complained, “is 
why Miss Barocco should have run away—if she did, as 
you insist—without leaving me a word.” 

“Oh! you’ll hear from her before the day’s out. She’ll 
call up or somethin’. Prob’ly it was like this: she’s too 
excited to sleep long, and wakes up and remembers some¬ 
thin’ important she wanted to do and maybe hadn’t told 
you about. She figures it out if she wakes you up and 
tells you she’s off on the war-path again, you’ll put up 
one terrible holler; so, she tells herself, the sensible way 
is beat it and explain afterwards. Question is: What 
did she have on her mind ?” 

For some minutes he pursued his restless tramping 


174 BAROQUE 

without interruption. Then the man in the bed an¬ 
nounced : 

“I can’t seem to remember her saying anything that 
would account for her running away without notice this 
morning; unless—it may have been she was worried on 
account of that old nurse of hers, Marcella.” 

“Don’t listen reasonable to me. It must’ve been a more 
powerful motive, somethin’ big, to make her get up, worn 
out like she was, and leave you, knowin’ how you’d 
worry.” 

“Well,” Rodney reluctantly admitted, “there’s always 
the chance she repented of having listened to me and 
allowed herself to be persuaded she was doing the wrong 
thing in following up her vendetta—” 

“Had she promised she’d give it up?” Ritchey de¬ 
manded, stopping at the foot of the bed. 

“Can’t say she had:—not in so many words. But our 
understanding was implicit—” 

“Son!” the detective interrupted in pained paternal 
patience: “you want to get cured of kiddin’ yourself a 
woman ever means anythin’ without she’s promised. And 
then gen’ly they don’t. Some of ’em will keep a promise 
if you hold her to it, and maybe Miss Barocco’s that kind, 
I don’t say she isn’t; but no woman ever breathed that 
gave a whoop in Harlem for what you call an implicit 
understandin’. Nope: nor many men either.” 

Rodney rose excitedly on an elbow. 

“Then you think—” 

“Lie down!” Ritchey fairly barked. “You do like the 
doctor ordered, or I won’t tell you what I think.” 

Rodney groaned, but had to give in; and the detective 
resumed his talk and walk at one and the same time. 

“I think Miss Barocco let you con her into thinkin’ 
maybe you was right, she’d better quit and leave things 
lay; and then she fell asleep, and after while woke up 
in the dark and thought it over cold; and it all come back 
to her then, the way she’d been feelin’ about this thing 


BAROQUE 175 

for months and months; and you ain’t there to talk her 
out of it again. And presently she remembers somethin’ 
she’d maybe overlooked—you know how it is when you 
wake up in the middle of the night and lie thinkin’, things 
seems to sort of shift into new combinations and don’t 
look like they did in the daytime at all. So she says to 
herself: ‘If I do this and that, I’ll ’ve pulled it off and 
made it a clean job; and I can, easy, s’long’s there ain’t 
nobody taggin’ along to tell me I mustn’t or maybe put in 
his oar and upset the applecart.’ So she gets up quiet 
and does a swift sneak, and don’t know nothin’ about 
what happened to you after that. And when you hear 
from her again, chances are it’ll all be over but the 
shoutin’.” 

“You may be right,” Rodney agreed after thinking this 
over. “If you are, our plain course is to find Angelo. 
The trail of the man who betrayed Baroque Brothers to 
you is bound to lead her to Angelo sooner or later, so the 
way to find Francesca is to watch Angelo.” 

“What makes you think that ?” Ritchey demanded, again 
pulling up to an abrupt standstill. “Who told you Angelo 
turned that dirty trick on his own father and uncle?” 

“One doesn’t have to be a detective sergeant, Ritchey, 
to put two and two together. Angelo had motive enough 
for a man of his low order of character, both incentive 
and opportunity. I know he suspected something was 
going to happen, because when I went to call on his father 
by appointment that night, I saw Angelo skulking on the 
Fifth Avenue corner, watching the house; and when he 
caught sight of me he all but took to his heels. And now 
he’s in a panic because his sister threatens to denounce 
the informer to the Camorra. Why should he have been 
afraid of me that night? or of her now, if his conscience 
is clean?” 

“Maybe you’re takin’ a lot for granted, Mr. Manship,” 
Ritchey commented. “But I’ll never say so, because 
you’re right.” 


176 


BAROQUE 


“It was Angelo!” 

“Yop. Guess it’s safe to tell you that much. I traced 
the tip-off back to him; and ever since I’ve been keepin’ 
an eye on that bird. He don’t like it, neither.” 

“No question about that. Did I tell you (no, don’t 
think I’ve seen you since) his shyster lawyer, Mr. Leo 
Croce, called on me one day to protest against what he 
was pleased to term my persecution of his client? Angelo 
had found out he was being shadowed and naturally 
blamed it on me, his sister’s representative in this coun¬ 
try.” 

Ritchey grinned, gratified. 

“Fussed him, did I? That’s too darn’ bad!” 

“Coarse work, if you ask me.” 

“Oh! I don’t know. They’s two ways of shadowin’ a 
suspect: you let him know it, or else you don’t. The best 
way’s a combination of both. If he knows it, it makes him 
jumpy and liable to foolish breaks; or else he gets to 
know his shadow by sight and wastes time framin’ him; 
and when he sees how easy that is, he gets overconfident 
and pulls some raw deal and gets away with it to the 
Queen’s taste, as far’s the bull he’s spotted is concerned. 
But that’s gen’ly the time when the shadow he don’t know 
about steps in and scores. That’s the system I’ve been 
playin’ Angelo on; and he’ll be surprised when he finds 
out how much I know about his private business. I could 
tell you a lot of things . . . Did you know he’s figurin’ 
to leave the country?” 

“No!” 

“Yop. Or if he isn’t, you can’t believe in signs. He’s 
been turnin’ everythin’ into cash, everythin’ his father 
left but the house they used to live in and the shop on 
the corner; and they’re on the market, the only reason 
they haven’t been sold is because nobody’s offered anythin’ 
near the real value of the property. And a little while ago 
he put in application for a passport. He hasn’t got it yet, 
though. And I haven’t been able to find out what boat 


BAROQUE 


177 


he figures to sail on. If he’s made a reservation it’s prob’ly 
under an assumed name, and he won’t take it up till the 
last minute.” 

“That’s very interesting. Miss Barocco ought to know.” 

“She will, soon as she turns up again.” The telephone 
shrilled in the sitting-room. Ritchey went to answer it, 
volunteering as he passed through the door: “If that’s her 
now, I’ll put her wise.” 

He was gone long enough for Rodney to work himself 
into a fever of impatience, but returned with an impassive 
countenance and the announcement: “Wrong number. At 
least, that’s what the party claimed. I got a hunch maybe 
it was Friend Angelo callin’ up to see if anybody’d an¬ 
swer. If nobody did, of course, it would be glad news for 
the undertaker. Anyway, I got the supervisor at Central 
and told her to trace the call if she could.” 

“Look here,” Rodney suggested: “if you know so much 
about Angelo’s habits, you ought to be able to locate that 
gang he sic’d on me last night.” 

“Line ’em up for you inside twenty-four hours, if you 
think you can identify ’em.” 

“No fear. They kept me too busy, while it lasted; it 
was dark there in that hallway, besides. But how about 
the lot that initiated Francesca? And the house by the 
river ?” 

“I could lead you there with my eyes shut. As for the 
‘Council’ outfit, I’ve only been waitin’ for a good excuse 
to round ’em up—it was no good without I could pin some¬ 
thin’ on them. But what Miss Barocco told you satisfies 
me it was them that was in with Liborio Baroque in the 
drug smugglin’ game; and with that to go on I ought to 
be able to send the whole bunch up the river. Anyhow, 
it’s up to me to start somethin’ and see what happens. But 
the first thing is to get that cable off to Italy.” 

“Why bother about that, when you’ve got work so much 
more important to do here ?” 

“Depends on what you call important. You don’t want 


178 


BAROQUE 


to forget, puttin’ old Aniello Ansiello behind the bars is 
the first trick we’ve got to turn for the girl’s sake. When 
we begin to get action on this info you just slipped me, 
he’ll know somebody must’ve spilled the beans over here; 
and he’s wise enough, believe me, to guess who and take 
steps accordin’ly. So if you don’t want to have your 
fiancy gunned up without notice by some wild-eyed Wop, 
you better let me fix the ‘Old One’ so’s he won’t be able 
to do nobody no more harm.” 

“Heaven knows I’m willing! But isn’t there some way 
we can protect Francesca against attempts at retalia¬ 
tion— ?” 

“If the Camorra ever gets wise to who started the leak, 
the best thing your little lady can do is travel and keep 
on travelling for a good while. But let me play my hand 
my own way and nobody’ll ever know. As soon as I’ve 
tied old man Ansiello’s hands and put Angelo where he 
belongs, where he’ll get his three square reg’lar and 
plenty light exercise to help him digest ’em—well! who’s 
goin’ to guess what ever become of Mister Luigi Barocco, 
that promisin’ young immigrant from Naples? I and 
you won’t spill the beans, and you can count on Angelo’s 
keepin’ his trap tight for fear they might get his little 
sister and make it ‘Good night, nurse,’ for him, too.” 

Ritchey consulted his watch and clamped a fresh cigar, 
which he did not light, between his teeth. 

“I’ll be on my way, now, if it’s all the same to you—I 
mean, if you promise to lie quiet there and not do nothin* 
foolish till you hear from me.” 


XXVIII 


fe I 

73 ODNEY was at pains to promise neither to keep 
quietly abed nor to refrain from actions of a con¬ 
structively lunatic nature, pending receipt of further word 
from Ritchey. In fact, he didn’t believe he could keep 
such a promise, and had no intention of subjecting himself 
to the strain of trying. 

Neither did Ritchey press the point, but to the contrary, 
having voiced his views of what under the circumstances 
would be common-sense conduct, serenely went about his 
business, as if quite confident that Rodney would comply 
with his wishes. But perhaps this was so only because 
Ritchey was the wiser of the two. 

For if Rodney’s mind was sorely troubled in conse¬ 
quence of having won and lost his love within twelve 
hours, the physical distress of having been severely man¬ 
handled, deprived of a fair quantum of sleep, and chloro¬ 
formed to the brink of death, all in the same period, was 
desperately enervating. And if Rodney heard the outer 
door slam behind Ritchey in entire anticipation of being 
unable to lie still another minute, once alone he perceived 
that to get up and fuss about would be merely to paw 
the air with aimless gestures. For what could he do? 

Lacking the slenderest clue to Francesca’s whereabouts 
—more than the negative one inherent in the knowledge 
that she would certainly avoid returning to the tenement 
flat where “Luigi Barocco” had lived with his ancient 
“aunt,” reckoning that Rodney would be sure to seek her 
there—to rise, dress, sally forth, and barge blindly to 
and fro in the streets of New York, on the off-chance of 
running across the girl or some trace that would lead to 
her, would be even more futile than to winnow the hay¬ 
stack for the needle of tradition. 

179 


180 


BAROQUE 


There was, after all, nothing one could do but possess 
one’s soul in such patience as one could command, and 
wait for word. Ritchey might be depended upon to do 
everything possible out of friendship for Rodney, and in 
the line of his duty, besides. While Francesca would 
surely not leave him to fret himself into a fever one min¬ 
ute longer than he must, longer than she needed to accom¬ 
plish what she had set out to do, whatever that might be. 

Provided, of course, Ritchey were right in his guess at 
the reason for her absence . . . 

It was hard to believe that the girl could have gone of 
her own volition without leaving a message of some sort, 
a line or a word to comfort the man who loved her and 
whom (O thought of felicity incomparable!) she loved. 

Still, there it was, the stark, incomprehensible fact that, 
apparently, she had done just that very thing; something 
which Rodney proved to his sorry satisfaction by getting 
out of bed (not without groans and imprecations, for he 
was stiff and sore all over) and padding barefoot round 
bedchamber and living-room in search of signs which 
Ritchey might have overlooked, but finding nothing either 
to aggravate or tranquillize the doubts which preyed upon 
his mind. 

Other than the strange handkerchief, a silk bandanna, 
that had been used to bind his wrists, the sponge, and the 
towel which had been comandeered from his bathroom 
to aid in chloroforming him, nothing was out of order in 
the apartment. Neither did Rodney find anything what¬ 
ever in the nature of a message . . . 

And that Francesca had left of her own free will seemed 
to be proved not only by the absence of any indications 
of a struggle, but also by the fact that she had taken time 
to put on again the collar, tie and shoes which Rodney 
had removed, while she slept. 

No: she had gone voluntarily, in her own leisure. 

Simple thoughtlessness alone could account for such 
action, preoccupation with the enterprise which (accord- 


BAROQUE 181 

ing to Ritchey’s surmise) she had waked up in the night 
to conceive and act upon. Or else indifference! Or, it 
might be, repentance, regret for the impulsiveness which 
had moved her to pledge herself in a moment of emotional 
excitement ? 

A hateful thought, and one that Rodney, after the 
fashion of lovers in the absence of the one beloved, could 
by no means forget or reason out of mind. It was so 
possible, he argued. Who was he to have won the heart 
of a creature of such transcendent charms ? Or to hold it! 
Who was he that she should not, on sober second thought, 
perceive her mistake and take hasty, furtive measures 
to mend it ? 

Appalled by the mere suggestion, Rodney crawled mis¬ 
erably back into bed to plague himself ill with it. 

If lovers were reasonable creatures, they would not be 
lovers. It is well, then, for the welfare of the race, tol¬ 
erantly to contemplate their aberrations. 

Nor would they be lovers, of course, were they not 
human. And Rodney was so hopelessly and intensely 
human that, even while he writhed in the torments of the 
self-damned, exhausted nature asserted itself, he fell 
asleep. 

This time no dream disturbed his slumbers. He was 
so well worn out, indeed, that he slept like one dead, 
unstirring for hours on end; and three times while he 
slept the telephone in the next room (the door to which 
he had left open with precisely this contingency in mind) 
trilled and trilled unheard; and once, toward the end of 
that sultry day, two men entered, the superintendent 
Stiles again admitting Ritchey, and stood over Rodney 
and talked without trying to avoid waking him—and he 
slept sweetly on. 

“Well! he needs it all right, if any guy ever did,” 
Ritchey concluded. “And s’long’s it’s natural sleep, we 
should worry. Only when he didn’t answer the ’phone, I 
begun to wonder if they’d maybe got to him again. I’ll be 


182 


BAROQUE 


on my way—got a busy night ahead of me. Give him this 
when he wakes up, will you.” 

He scribbled a brief message, sealed it in an envelope, 
and went his way. 

In twilight, Rodney opened incredulous eyes upon his 
room again, glanced hastily at his watch, turned on the 
bedside lamp to make sure his eyes had not deceived him, 
swore fretfully, and tumbled out of bed. 

Nevertheless he delayed to find slippers and gird on a 
dressing-gown before stumbling into the sitting-room. No 
telling who might not be there, waiting for him to wake 
up . . . 

But there was no one.. 

A few minutes later the man Stiles appeared in re¬ 
sponse to agitation of the service bell. 

“No, sir,” he reported—“nobody’s called today ex¬ 
ceptin’ Mr. Ritchey. He come ’bout an hour ago—said 
he’d tried to get you on the ’phone, and you didn’t answer. 
He left this.” 

Ritchey’s note was professionally terse: 

“Dear Mr. Manship: Just to say everything 
looks rosy. I look to have good news for you some 
time tonight, but I do not much expect to pull any¬ 
thing off much before 12 o’clock, so there is no sense 
you staying in, go to a show or something and do 
not worry, only be in around 12 M in case I call up. 

“Yrs truly, 

“Wm. K. Ritchey/ - ’ 

And from a full heart Rodney damned the good man 
for his wholly commendable reticence. 

It was towards eight o’clock and almost dark when he 
sought his club for dinner. Beneath a sky piled high 
with grim, forbidding thunderheads, like some dark genius 
of wrath and destruction shouldering up into the heavens 
from behind the Jersey hills and shadowing a doomed 



BAROQUE 


183 


world with the silent menace of its scowl, an atmosphere 
heavy with heat and humidity, motionless yet electrical 
with suspense, weighed without ruth upon the sweltering 
city. In this abnormal crepuscle street lights shone with 
morbid brilliance, faces were livid, and the movements 
of traffic grew uncertain and confused, as if those pon¬ 
derous, lumbering ’busses, fleetly schooling taxicabs, and 
sedate town-cars found a certain difficulty in seeing their 
way. Voices near at hand rang with curious clearness, 
the ceaseless growl of Town was muted to a sullen pur¬ 
ring like that of some great beast mutinously quiescent. 

The club dining-room was already beginning to empty; 
and much to the relief of Rodney, who had armed him¬ 
self with an evening paper against possible overtures of a 
social nature, not a soul he knew was present; so he set¬ 
tled down to read while satisfying the sharp hunger for 
which he had to thank a twenty-four hour fast. 

For that matter, the newspaper was the first he had 
seen in thirty-six; but it was through no real desire to 
get up on the news again that he scanned column 
after column with meticulous interest, it was merely the 
normal lunacy of a man in love that led him to search the 
paper through and through for that name round which 
all his world revolved. 

You never could be sure, she might have met with 
some accident or other . . . 

The word Naples caught his eye in the cable news; and 
he read, with such wonder as one might know on seeing 
the name of a king of Faerie figuring in current history, 
a despatch that related of the death of one Aniello 
Ansiello, “the last great chieftain of the Camorra.” 

The Italian police, it appeared, stimulated to extraor¬ 
dinary efforts by the murder of four Carabinieri at the 
hands of a notorious Camorrista assassin, Tobia Basile, 
who had himself perished resisting arrest, had discovered 
the secret headquarters of the Camorra in an ancient and 
supposedly deserted palazzo, had thrown a cordon of 


184 


BAROQUE 


troops about it and arrested everybody within its walls— 
all, that is, but one who was found dead in an invalid 
chair, killed by poison self-administered, Aniello Ansiello, 
the Supreme Master of the Society in the heyday of its 
power, who had mysteriously disappeared and for nearly 
thirty years had been believed to be dead. 

“It is believed,” the despatch wound up, “that this 
marks the end of the Camorra as a social and political 
power in Naples, over which city it has exercised almost 
despotic rule for upwards of a hundred years. ,, 

Rodney put the paper aside with a silent prayer of 
thanksgiving. 

That peril, seemingly, was laid. Save in the improbable 
event that the “Old One” had been merely playing with 
Francesca, and that advices betraying her were already 
on the way to, if not actually in the United States, she 
had nothing now to fear from the only man in the Ca¬ 
morra who, aside from her brother, had been a party to 
the secret of her impersonation. 

And if Ritchey had not been too optimistic in his 
guarded assurances, or Rodney in interpreting them, to¬ 
night would write Finis to the American chapter of her 
foolhardy history as “Luigi Barocco.” 

For nothing (Rodney vowed, in his abstraction thump¬ 
ing the table with an emphasis which excited the amuse¬ 
ment of hovering waiters) was more certain than that, 
once he found Francesca again, he would never give her 
a second opportunity to escape him, never leave her till 
he had re-established that dominion over her mind and 
emotions which had, last night, so nearly wrung from her 
the promise to forego her vengeance. 

Toward this consummation extreme, even heroic meas¬ 
ures were indicated; but contemplation of them left Rod¬ 
ney undismayed. 

For if it was true that as a maiden errant Francesca was 
and must forever be free to follow the whims of her own 
sweet will, it was no less true that as his wife . . . 


XXIX 


*T , HE storm held off, but the city knew no relief from 
the burden of its promise, and reading the handwriting 
in characters of fugitive flame upon the jetty walls of 
Heaven in the West, trembled and held its breath in ex¬ 
pectation. And the threat vibrant in air surcharged with 
unspent energy rendered all humanity, in the mass and 
individually, astatic and distraught. 

Certainly it did little to soothe the nervous restlessness 
that afflicted Rodney when, refreshed and fortified by 
his day-long sleep and an excellent dinner, he found him¬ 
self with only hopes and fears to occupy his mind between 
nine o’clock and midnight. 

He revisited his rooms, found there precisely what he 
had expected, that is to say nothing new, tried to settle 
down and wait in peace, like a sensible body would, but 
had his trouble for his pains; and after fifteen minutes of 
this snatched up hat and stick and took to the streets once 
more, hoping to win distraction at least in exercise. 

For an hour or more he plunged blindly, at wild ran¬ 
dom, through the sullen night, downtown and up again, 
heedless whither he wandered, turning back at a point 
well below Washington Square only in obedience to some 
obscure admonition of the unconscious mind. Nor was it 
until he found himself at a standstill, with straw hat in 
one hand, the other dabbling a handkerchief over a drip¬ 
ping forehead, on a corner of Madison Avenue over 
across from that which for so many years had been dedi¬ 
cated to the business of Baroque Brothers, that he appre¬ 
ciated whither his subliminal drift had been leading him, 
what driving curiosity had been excited in him that 

J85 


186 


BAROQUE 


morning, by Ritchey’s casual mention of the property, to 
look again upon the place where he first had viewed the 
face of fatality. 

There was poor reward, however, in the desolate visage 
which the shop showed the street. The window had been 
repaired which Liborio had broken in his last moment of 
life, but naturally the firm name had not been restored to 
the new sheet of plate-glass, the card of a real-estate 
agent filled its place, and all the shades inside were drawn 
down to the sills. 

The upper floors had always, Rodney knew, been let 
as small apartments; and dull lights burned now behind 
open windows on the second and fourth floors, though 
those on the third and fifth were dark. 

For some minutes Rodney lingered, bareheaded, of two 
minds whether to go on uptown or let himself be influ¬ 
enced by an impulse such as the lovelorn know too well 
and turn aside for a closer look at the front of the house 
that adjoined the shop on the cross-town street. It had 
been really there that he had first met Francesca, not in 
the shop . . . 

On the other hand it clearly seemed the part of pru¬ 
dence to go home, and that without delay; a drift of hot 
air was soughing languidly eastward through the streets, 
the mutter of thunder over the Jersey hills was growing 
louder and more savage with each successive roll, there 
could be little doubt but that the storm was soon to break. 

Then abruptly, as if decided by sheeted lightning which 
turned the western firmament into one vast canopy of 
flame, he put on his hat, crossed the avenue, and keeping 
to the opposite side of the street started to walk slowly 
past what had been the Barocco home. 

At the same time the wind plucked up spirit and began 
to lift dust and lesser debris and send it scurrying in 
blinding clouds. Here and there blots of warmish water 
as big as dollars appeared as by magic upon bone-dry 
asphaltum. Footfarers caught at their hats and quickened 


BAROQUE 


187 


their steps. Those of means who had trusted too long 
to luck, ran for the avenues and signalled frantically at 
scampering taxis which, already chartered by foresighted 
folk, acknowledged all such appeals only by accelerating 
their pace. Rodney alone seemed to set no value on the 
menace of the storm, but maintained the same deliberate 
gait, gazing fixedly at the dark house over the way. 

Possibly because it was on the market, its ground-floor 
doors and windows had not been boarded, like those of 
its neighbours whose occupants had forsaken Town for 
the Summer. Behind their grilles they were as blank 
holes of blackness. But shades were drawn at all win¬ 
dows on the upper floors, and the absence of any hint 
of artificial light seemed to indicate that the premises 
lacked even a caretaker:—or else boasted one whose notion 
of taking care was to go to bed at an unusually early hour. 

Or—could he be mistaken?—was that the flare of a 
match in the backwards of the entrance-hall, beyond the 
iron-barred glass of the front door? 

Rodney stopped short; but a great cloud of dust blew 
between him and the house, when it passed rain began 
to fall in good earnest, and the darkness of the dwell¬ 
ing across the way was unrelieved. 

Calling himself a fanciful idiot, he picked up his heels 
and made for Fifth Avenue, but was met half-way by a 
downpour of such severity that he was fain to take cover 
in the recessed doorway to a mercantile establishment. 

Here he was protected in a measure, marooned between 
the locked doors behind him and the deluged street before, 
but hugely discontented and inclined to curse himself for 
a mooning fool. Anybody else would have had sense 
enough to hurry home while there was time . . . 

A flash of lightning permitted consultation of his watch. 
It marked half after ten. There was comfort, at all 
events, in the knowledge that he was not due in his rooms, 
to answer the telephone or receive Ritchey’s report in 
person, for another ninety minutes; long before which 


188 


BAROQUE 


time the storm, if it ran true to the form of New York’s 
summer showers, should have spent its first fury—some¬ 
thing he might count himself fortunate not to be obliged 
immediately to brave. For its first fury was uncommonly 
furious, and no mistake. 

The air was grey with driven water, a veil now thick 
now thin, through which the buildings on the far side 
of the street were spectral shapes fading and wavering. 
The rattle and crash of thunder was almost continuous; 
when now and anon it subsided for a little the night was 
loud with the crepitation of a myriad brittle lances broken 
upon the pave. Lightning alternately flooded the world 
with blinding glares of ghastly white and played like a 
searching sword through the bellying arrasses of rain. 

Rodney crouched back as far as he could to escape the 
backspatter, and lighted a cigarette. The flickering match 
turned his thoughts back to the phenomenon which he 
had thought to descry through the glass doors of the 
deserted house. But in all likelihood he had imagined 
that, or been deceived by the reflection from a match 
lighted in a window on his own side of the way. Any¬ 
thing was possible, of course . . . Even that Angelo, 
for reasons of his own, perhaps to hide away from Fran¬ 
cesca or Ritchey, had sought refuge in his abandoned 
home ... Or that Francesca, failing to find her brother 
in his accustomed haunts, was hunting him there! 

Startled by the possibilities latent in these surmises, 
Rodney edged forward and peered out. A flare of light¬ 
ning afforded a view of the Barocco house at an oblique 
angle. Darkness succeeded, thickened by the grey, shak¬ 
ing curtains. Had it been only over-eager fancy that made 
him think he saw a figure in the doorway of the Barocco 
house, entering or departing, he could not say which, so 
brief had been the glimpse? 

If he had seen something of the sort, the chances were 
all that it was some storm-swept wight taking shelter, like 
himself. 


BAROQUE 


189 


But perhaps not . . . 

Without premeditation Rodney found himself out in 
the rain again, pelting toward Madison Avenue and at 
the same time striking diagonally across the street. 

In two breaths his clothing was drenched through and 
through, he could feel the very shirt on his back grow 
cold and wet to the skin. 

Half-blinded, dazed and out of breath, he gained the 
sidewalk in front of the dwelling wherein his interest 
centered, paused long enough to satisfy himself there was 
no one skulking in the doorway, no light visible behind 
the glass, then held on. Idle to try the door if Angelo 
were hiding there, dangerous to boot: Rodney had another 
scheme in mind, one that had without recognition been 
formulating itself ever since he had been struck by the 
possibility that the house might not, after all, be as de¬ 
serted as it seemed. 

Once round the corner, he darted into the vestibule of 
the building whose ground floor was given over to the 
now vacant shop, and studied the names on a rank of 
brass-bound letter boxes. Then he pressed the button 
beneath the box numbered 2. A few seconds later the 
electric latch clicked and, pushing open the door, Rodney 
passed into the hallway and ran panting up the stairs. 

A door stood open on the first landing, framing a young 
man who wore a dressing-gown, a pipe, and an expres¬ 
sion of inhospitable indifference. Rodney greeted him 
by stopping and assuming a blank look. 

“Mr. Miller?” he enquired. 

The young man looked him dispassionately up and 
down, reckoned him a respectable person by the cut of 
his sodden clothing, at least no sneak-thief, removed the 
pipe from between his teeth long enough to articulate 
“Upstairs—two more flights,” turned back into his apart¬ 
ment, and banged the door. 

Rodney went on up, briskly on the second flight, cau¬ 
tiously on the third, stealthily along the fourth floor hall- 


190 


BAROQUE 


way and past the door to Mr. Miller’s quarters, still more 
stealthily up to the fifth floor. 

Here it was quite dark, but he struck matches and their 
guidance located an iron ladder leading up to the roof. 
The hatch that closed the trap was in place, but not 
hooked down (this he took for a favourable omen) and, 
pushing it back, he clambered out upon the roof. 

It was blowing harder up there than it had been in the 
street, and the rainfall as well was, if anything, more 
savage. Also, it was pitch black, save when lightning 
rent the skies. 

By its fitful play Rodney picked his way across to the 
roof of the Barocco house and located its hatchway. 

Hope had not misled him: when he knelt and dug 
fingers under the edge of the hatch, it yielded readily. 
So much for the common carelessness of householders 
and domestics! 

Carefully sliding the cover back, he bent over the 
opening. 

A draught of stale air fanned up into his face, sicken- 
ingly hot. 

No hint of human occupation in the blackness that 
yawned below, no glimmer of light, no sound . . . 

Letting his feet down through the trap, Rodney fished 
around with them till they found iron rungs. These he 
descended till his head was below the coaming; and paus¬ 
ing to drag the hatch back into place, he climbed on down 
to the floor. 

Only then did he stop to consider his status of a house¬ 
breaker, subject to being shot at sight. 


XXX 


13 ODNEY in those days accounted himself neither 
more or less heroic in spiritual stature than the next 
man or the next dozen one might meet. Years in France 
had well revised the conventional conceptions of courage 
and cowardice with which his education had duly equip¬ 
ped him for the adventure of life. He had learned that 
man is brave or fearful as the case may be—according 
to the time of day, the power of his passions, the stuff of 
his convictions, the strength of his digestion. He himself 
had not without honour in the minds and mouths of men 
come through that cruel ordeal of War—and now stood 
quaking in his boots because he knew that, having accom¬ 
plished an act of burglary, he had put himself outside the 
law and at the mercy of the householder, one who, if 
he were at home, as Rodney believed him to be, would 
surely show no mercy. 

Alone and unarmed in the stronghold of an enemy, 
who twice in the last twenty-four hours had attempted 
his life, Rodney was frankly and thoroughly frightened 
and repentant of the quixotic rashness with which he 
had accepted the challenge to his imagination offered by 
this ostensibly untenanted house. 

Wholeheartily he wished himself well out of it. 

Yet there was nothing definite to encourage misgiv¬ 
ings. The house was dark and still—that was all. He 
could allege no good excuse for this unmanly distilling 
of dread from its darkness, horror from its hush. 

But it was black enough in all conscience, there in the 
hallway of the upper floor. Intermittently the stricken 
heavens filled the glazed skylight with an eerie greenish- 

191 


192 


BAROQUE 


violet glare, and revealed a row of doors, some open, 
some closed, the head of the stair-well, the balustrade 
round its black maw. 

To this last he found his way and, gripping the hand¬ 
rail, leaned out and gazed down. 

Nothing but darkness; silence but for the drumfire of 
rain on the roof . . . 

Then again that ghastly illumination of the glass dome 
overhead—and Rodney started back with a hammering 
heart. 

Was it fact or fancy, that he had seen, by that instant¬ 
aneous flare, the pale oval of a face upturned and watch¬ 
ful at the bottom of the well, five flights below ? 

If so, whose? Angelo’s, Francesca’s, a care-taker’s? 

Could he possibly have made so much noise, cautiously 
as he had worked, lifting that hatch and replacing it 
after climbing in? 

If so, his head and shoulders, jutting out beyond the 
balustrade, must have been clearly silhouetted against the 
skylight, to the watcher down below. 

Tempted to withdraw incontinently, he put that thought 
aside. It might have been Francesca’s face that he had 
seen—if he had seen anything . . . And while the pos¬ 
sibility of her being in the house, alone, alarmed, remained 
a question, he could never go. 

He waited for another flash, but with the top of his 
head projecting beyond the rail just far enough to let 
him use his eyes. When it came he saw . . . nothing. 

Neither was any sound in the house audible above the 
clamour of the storm. 

Delay grew as unendurable as it was unprofitable. In 
the end he had to take his courage and his life in his 
hands and brave the unknown . . . 

With infinite caution, keeping close to the wall and 
back from the handrail, he forced himself down the stairs 
step by step, flight after flight, with many and long pauses 
to reconnoiter. And nothing happened, he heard and 


BAROQUE 


193 


saw nothing to give him pause. What he could deter¬ 
mine, or guess at, of conditions in the house was merely 
what he had looked forward to, an emptiness swept and 
garnished. He judged that little if any of the furniture 
had been removed. The lightning, tempered by drawn 
window-shades, showed him rooms peopled with weird 
assemblages of shapes crouching, squat and monstrous, 
under dust-cloths. And he was gratefully aware that the 
carpet had not been taken up on the stairs or in the hall¬ 
ways. 

But the farther he descended, the more near he drew 
to danger—if there were any; and going on the evidences 
of senses never more alert, he began to doubt if there 
were; that is, until about half-way down the flight to 
the drawing-room floor. Then he got the notion that he 
was being stalked from above rather than, as he had as¬ 
sumed, stalking whatever it was, if anything, that skulked 
below. 

Something, he couldn’t say what, seemed to warn him 
of a presence, an intelligence hostile and malignant, on 
the stairs behind him. 

He stopped dead, and half-turned, in a shudder of ap¬ 
prehension, a shiver rippling down his spine, the breath 
catching in his throat, hairs lifting upon his scalp—as if 
he thought to see some hideous and inhuman face of 
terror leering at his shoulder, livid with corpse-light in 
the mirk. 

But the darkness was impenetrable. And the vertex 
of the storm had passed, carrying with it the worst of the 
lightning; Rodney could no more depend upon its broken 
fire-play to guide him clear of gins and pitfalls. 

Nevertheless, he knew that there was something there, 
on the steps behind him, something that hadn’t been there 
when a moment since he had passed the spot where it 
now hung poised, something that watched and mocked 
him, following when he went on, stopping when he stop¬ 
ped; something that, worst of all, cut off retreat to the 


194 BAROQUE 

roof and left him without choice but to go on down to 
his fate decreed. 

In sudden panic, throwing caution to the winds, he 
started to run down to the landing. Three steps—and a 
cord stretched across the stairs caught his feet and threw 
him headlong. 

He fell with a force that jarred every inch of him and 
drove the breath out of his lungs in a groaning blast. 
Momentarily half-stunned and helpless, he lay with limbs 
spasmodically a-twitch; and felt a heavy body drop upon 
his back, pinning him to the floor. 

A voice cried out exultantly in Italian, his arms were 
jerked behind him with brutal force and caught together 
with cord above the elbows, his captor rose and turned 
him over, a dancing spotlight drew near and steadied to 
his face, he heard the accents of Angelo, irritable and 
contemptuous. 

“The busy lawyer boy!” 

The oleaginous voice of Mr. Croce replied—and 
shaken as he was, Rodney could almost see the accom¬ 
panying flash of teeth. 

“My haughty opponent. Tck !”—a cluck of impatience 
—“what a catch!” 


XXXI 


ANGELO replied with something grumbled indis¬ 
tinctly, by its ring of discontent an Italian male¬ 
diction of every day. The beam of his torch winked out, 
blinding darkness fell, for some moments there was 
silence, no one spoke, no one moved—but Rodney vainly 
tested the strength of his bonds. Then a sigh, long and 
weary with disconsolation . . . 

A blaze of lightning without thunder defined the semi- 
translucent rectangles of the drawing-room windows, and 
a ghostly glimmer penetrated to the hallway where, at 
the foot of the stairs, Rodney lay, affording him a fugitive 
impression of the two Italians standing over him—An¬ 
gelo drooping against the balustrade in a posture of pro¬ 
found dejection. 

Out of the darkness Croce’s accents issued with a ring 
of mockery: 

“Well, my friend! now you’ve got this gentleman where 
you’ve been wanting him so long, what are you going to 
do with him?” 

Angelo’s response was again unintelligible, a mutter 
of resentment. Another pause: Rodney became aware 
that he was recovering from the shock of his downfall, 
and discovered a curiosity, surpassing even that of Mr. 
Croce as indicated by his query, concerning the temper of 
Angelo toward himself. Why in Heaven’s name was the 
fellow hesitating? 

Of a sudden Angelo pronounced morosely: “Luck of 
the devil!” 

“Meaning Mr. Manship’s?” the polite voice of Croce 
enquired with interest. 

“No—mine! These damnable delays, this storm from 

195 


196 


BAROQUE 


hell, and then”—none too gently his foot made sure that 
Rodney hadn’t moved— “this!” 

“Easily disposed of.” 

“Think so ?” 

“We can’t take him away,” Croce cheerily pointed out, 
“we’d be fools to leave him here.” 

“Never that!” 

“Then you know what to do.” 

“I don’t. I think the fool bears a charmed life. I 
begin to be afraid. Luck’s against me!” 

“ Tck! Always beefing about your luck. A lucky man 
is one who carves out his own luck with his own steel.” 

“That doesn’t tell me how to silence . . .” 

“Doesn’t it ?” Croce in civil surprise enquired. 
“Thought it did.” 

“If he had only died in his own rooms!” Angelo com¬ 
plained bitterly—“no one would ever have known for 
sure. But here—!” 

“Precisely,” Rodney put in pleasantly from the floor. 
“Difficult to hide my remains, you know; and Ritchey 
would scour the known world to get you. Besides, a 
shot might be overheard and complicate the problem of 
your escape. ... Of course you understand, I offer 
these suggestions merely for what they may be worth, 
in a purely sporting spirit.” 

“Shut up!” Angelo snapped. “That is, unless you 
want me to gag you.” 

“The triangolo works in silence,” Croce helpfully 
stated, “and silence falls where it has worked.” 

“You think of all the nice things, don’t you?” Rodney 
observed. “And I’d been wondering where Mr. Baroque 
got his inspirations.” 

But there was none of this bravado in his heart, only 
incredulity. Impossible to believe that this matter-of- 
fact conversation could be concerned with his murder in 
cold blood . . . 

“There’s no other way out,” Angelo wearily decided, 


BAROQUE 197 

after a brief pause. “Pick him up, will you, and bring 
him into the library. Well want a light.” 

“Why, ‘we’?” Croce demanded in pained expostulation. 
“Why drag me in? This is your affair, my friend. Pm 
off to call a taxi. We’ve waited long enough, too 
long . . ” 

“Go by all means—to the devil, if you like.” 

Angelo’s voice lost volume with his receding footfalls. 
Croce bent over Rodney, wound a hand into his collar, 
and swung him awkwardly up on his feet. 

“For God’s sake!” Rodney protested. “You can’t mean 
this, Mr. Croce!” 

“That’s the surprising part of it: we can’t but we do. 
It’s too bad, I know, Mr. Manship, but you brought it on 
yourself. ... Now be nice—don’t hang back and make 
me treat you rough: I don’t owe you any courtesies, 
you know.” 

Holding Rodney’s arms firmly pinioned, the man pro¬ 
pelled him down the hall with a decision that brooked 
no opposition. 

“If you’d only had sense enough to keep out of this 
. . .Not that I blame you: she really is a charming girl. 
. . . But sooner or later every man has to be taught to 
mind his own business. Sorry the lesson has got to be 
such a hard one, but you’ve left us no choice; you and 
Francesca between you have worked us into a corner we 
can only fight our way out of.” 

Croce thrust Rodney into the gloom of the library, 
and released him. 

“I’m off,” he advised Angelo. “Won’t be five minutes ; 
and you’ll be ready when I come back, won’t you ?” 

“All right.” 

“I’ll shut the door here, and you might wait a few 
moments till I’m out of the house . . . Bless my heart! 
I am much too squeamish . . .” 

The voice died out beyond the closing door. Rodney 
had brought up against a chair. Gripping its back with 


198 


BAROQUE 


the hands caught together behind him, he steadied him¬ 
self and waited for the light Angelo had promised, waited 
while Fear closed numbing fingers round his heart, stole 
his breath away, and worked like hypnotism on his mind. 

Belowstairs the front door gave a hollow crash. Some¬ 
where nearby Angelo could be heard cursing Croce for 
a clumsy, incautious fool. Unreasonably he withheld 
the light. 

Tried beyond his strength, Rodney called out 
“Baroque!” in a voice that quavered in spite of himself. 

“Well ?” Angelo tersely replied. 

“In the name of God! come to your senses — 99 

“I have, long ago . . . It’s your turn now.” 

Rodney tried to continue his appeal, but hearing some¬ 
thing rustle in obscurity close at hand took it to mean that 
Angelo had changed his mind about the light or meant to 
do what was to be done first. He cried out incoherently 
in a strangled voice. 

The lights blazed up, a cry from Angelo drowned 
Rodney’s. They were not alone; at the wall, her hand 
on the switch, Francesca stood, in her dress of a man, 
confronting Angelo. 

Apparently the latter had been searching for the switch; 
but at sight of his sister he had cringed back and now 
stood, in the semi-crouch of an animal at bay, with his 
back to the doorway, his features working in alarm, 
hatred and dismay. In his tremulous grasp the dread 
triangolo caught the light and shivered like a tongue of 
evil flame. 

“You!” he spat, half choking— “you!” 

He would have said more, but could not for his rage, 
and feinted with the knife as if to strike Francesca down; 
but she was not deceived, she stood her ground. 

“Myself,” she replied evenly. “I felt sure I’d find you 
here. Thank God I did—in time!” 

The man dropped back a pace, lifted the knife, stared 
at it blankly, cast it from him as if afraid of it. 


BAROQUE 


199 


"How,” he stammered—“how—?” 

“How did I get in without your knowledge? Waited 
for thunder to drown the noise of the door, then crept 
up here while you two were tormenting poor Mr. Man- 
ship. Now I shall take him away with me.” 

She turned to go to Rodney, but Angelo flung between 
them. 

“No!” he screamed, barring her way with arms whose 
hands resembled claws. “No, you won’t take him away! 
D’you hear me? You won’t! You may go—damn you! 
I’ve got to let you go—but he stays, he stays! It’s my 
life or his.” 

Francesca made no immediate effort to press past him, 
but stood eyeing him steadily, her mouth twitching with 
disdain. 

“What of it? You say it’s his life or yours. But what 
is that to me ?” 

“You know—you know if he goes and talks, they’ll 
get me—” 

“And then—?” 

“If they get me”—Angelo seemed to be fighting with 
all his might to speak with coherence—“you’ll die, too. 
You don’t want to forget that. We’re twins. You can’t 
outlive me, I can’t outlive you. If you want to die, help 
that man escape—or try to—for I won’t let him go while 
I live.” 

“You mean—” 

“It’s life against life. Before I let him go, we’ll have 
it out here. Yes, you and I!” 

“If that suits you best.” Francesca shrugged. “But 
listen to me first: You are mistaken, Mr. Manship 
knows nothing, or as little as nothing, he couldn’t betray 
you if he wanted to. That power rests with me alone.” 

Angelo gave a start of dismay. 

“How is that, rests with you?” he quavered. 

“It is I who know all your infamy, Angelo, the wicked¬ 
ness you’ve struggled so hard to hide. From the first 


200 


BAROQUE 


I suspected, today I have learned the whole truth at 
last. And you my brother!” 

“Damn you!” the boy shrilled—“what do you know ?” 

He made as if to catch her by the shoulders and shake 
the truth out of her. She checked him with a look like a 
kick. He fell back, cowed, gibbering. 

“I know everything. And because one mother bore us 
. . . No: because I love Mr. Manship—Angelo, I give 
you one last chance. If you go now, go quickly and lose 
no time, you may save yourself. If you delay—” 

“Why should I go?” Angelo’s spirit had one final 
flash of defiance. “Because you tell me to? Do you 
think I’m afraid of you?” 

“I have sent the call to the Council. It will meet here 
in half an hour—in less. You have barely time to get 
away. When it assembles, I shall fulfil the vow I made 
with my hand upon the dead bosom of the father whom 
your treachery killed:—I shall denounce you, my own 
brother, for ’nfamita, and lay before the Council proofs 
it can’t question. But till they come—you are free 
to go.” 

Francesca offered to brush Angelo aside, only to find 
that fear and fury had tried his self-control beyond its 
strength. In that moment the tension, grown too severe, 
snapped, Angelo became no more a rational being but a 
maniac. 

With the inarticulate snarl of a maddened beast, he 
flung himself upon the girl, struck her in face and bosom, 
threw her back with such violence that she staggered, 
tripped, all but fell, saved herself only by catching hold 
of the desk. Then, while she strove to regain her balance, 
he tore for a moment frantically with fumbling fingers 
at the breast-pocket of his coat, worried something out, 
levelled it. 

Recognizing the shimmer of blued steel in his shaking 
hand, Rodney without hesitation hurled himself bodily 
upon the boy. With his hands bound he could do no 


BAROQUE 


201 


more; bound or no, he could do no less. The pistol 
exploded as his shoulder struck Angelo full on his left 
chest, knocked him fairly off his feet, sent him spinning 
and catching at the air, to collide with a chair, throw it 
over, and fall across its legs. 

The pistol flew out of his grasp, Rodney with a kick 
sent it skimming beneath the desk. 

He saw Francesca with a hand pressed to her bosom, 
a look of perplexity dilating the dark eyes in a face of 
deathly pallor. But she gave no other sign, and without 
suspicion he turned to give all his attention to the prob¬ 
lem of coping, handicapped as he was, with the madman 
who was already springing up from the floor and pulling 
himself together to fly at Rodney’s throat. 

Simultaneously the hall door was thrown open, Ritchey 
appeared upon the threshold, paused half a heartbeat to 
grasp the situation, then laying hold of Angelo threw him 
back into the arms of two other plainclothes men, and 
darted across the room to Francesca. 

He was in time to catch her as, all at once, her eyes 
closed, her lips opened, the hand fell away from her 
breast, her knees gave. 

A groan bubbled on Rodney’s lips. He started for¬ 
ward, but found himself held back by a policeman in 
uniform who had come in on the heels of the plain-clothes 
men and who, seeing Rodney with his arms bound, has¬ 
tened to set him free. 

“Easy!” he counselled in a voice of rough sympathy. 
“Stand still, and I’ll turn you loose in a jiffy, sir.” 

“Let me go,” Rodney pleaded. 

Ritchey looked up from the body which he had lowered 
gently to the floor. 

“No, Mr. Manship,” he insisted—“better stay where 
you are. It’s too late . . .” 

A scream of mortal terror interrupted him, and Angelo 
lunged forward madly, only to be jerked back by the 
detectives. 


202 


BAROQUE 


4 

“Too late? What d’you mean? She isn’t hurt!” 

“No,” Ritchey replied to him directly—“I guess you 
wouldn’t say she’s hurt, not now. It’s worse than that.” 

“Not dead ? Not dead!” 

For all answer, Ritchey turned back the front of the 
man’s coat which Francesca wore, exposing the bosom 
of a white shirt darkly and widely stained with blood. 

Again Angelo strained to break away, but without 
effect. 

“Not dead!” he shrieked. “Not dead!” 

With a sad shake of his head, Ritchey drew a white 
handkerchief from the pocket of Francesca’s coat, and 
with it reverently masked the sweetly immobile face up¬ 
turned to the light. 

Then hastily he rose and interrupted Rodney as the 
latter stumbled, stricken, toward the body of his love. 

“No, Mr. Manship,” he insisted kindly. “It’s too late, 
you can’t do nothin’ now. Wait a minute—watch!” 

He wound a firm arm round Rodney’s shoulders and 
swung him round to face Angelo. 

“Steady!” he begged in a hoarse whisper. “Take it 
easy, Mr. Manship, and —get this!” 

Without wonder, without comprehension, crushed by 
that first, cruel shock of grief, Rodney saw that Angelo 
had ceased to struggle, had fallen into a phase of strangely 
rigid passivity in the hands of the other detectives. 

His head lowered and thrust forward, mouth agape, 
eyes so wide in their downcast stare that a finger’s-breadth 
of white showed above their dark irides, he stood gazing 
at the still form of his twin sister, then with a convulsive 
start shrank back and fearfully consulted Ritchey with 
a glance. 

“For the love of God!” he stammered—“tell me she 
isn’t—!” # ' 

“You fired {he shot that killed her,” Ritchey brutally 
cut him short. “If you want to make anybody believe 


BAROQUE 203 

t 

you didn’t go to do it, save your lies for the jury that’ll 
send you to the Chair for murder in the first degree.” 

Angelo replied only in a husky monosyllable freighted 
with the fright that was freezing his heart: 

“Dead!” 

With a sharp, spasmodic movement he broke the hold 
of the plain-clothes men, took one uncertain step toward 
the body of his sister, essayed another but faltered, sway- 
ing, threw out his hands in the gesture of a man groping 
blindly in the dark, and without a moan, without more 
struggle, collapsed as if stricken down by an invisible 
hand. 

Ritchey dropped to his knees, heaved the boy over till 
he lay with face to the light, tore open his shirt, laid a 
hand above his heart. 

A curious smile darkened his plain countenance of a 
commonplace man. 

Then suddenly he swung upon his subordinates with 
indignant barks: 

“Here, you! run—find a doctor, quick—telephone for 
an ambulance! Don’t stand there like a pack of pop- 
eyed saps! Get a move on you—it’s life or death!” 

The detectives fell back in dismay, hesitated and, turn¬ 
ing with one accord, disappeared in haste. 

Ritchey nodded impatiently to the uniformed police¬ 
man. 

“Here, you! lend us a hand, and be quick. Got to 
get this stiff out of sight before the girl comes to.” 

“What!” Rodney cried—“what did you say ? She isn’t 
dead ?” 

Ritchey grinned broadly. 

“Not so’s you’d notice it—plugged through the shoulder 
and fainted from pain and loss of blood, that’s all.” 

“But—you said—!” 

“I wanted to see what he’d do, whaf’d happen when 
he thought he’d killed her. Member tellin’ me how these 
two thought they had to die at the same time, account 


204 


BAROQUE 


their bein’ twins ? Well! this one”:—he indicated the 
body of Angelo with a jerk of his head—“believed it good 
and hard, all right—so hard it killed him. Or I guess 
you might say he killed himself with fear. He was so 
sure he had to die, he did. But she . . 

He got up, taking the shoulders of Angelo as the 
policeman lifted his feet, to carry him out of the room. 

“Look for yourself, if you don’t believe me. Don’t 
let on to her, when she comes to, her brother’s dead; 
just tell her he’s under arrest. So long’s she don’t find 
out the truth too soon and scare herself to death, the 
same as him, she’ll live to see her great grand-children— 
hers and yours!” 

Alone with his beloved, Rodney lifted the handkerchief 
and bent solicitously over the face of fatality. 

The breath of parted lips fanned softly the cheek he 
lowered to them. He could see pulses beating in the 
sweet hollows of that round young throat. And as he 
watched the lashes stirred, the eyes unveiled, she saw 
him, knew him, and smiling faintly murmured his 
name. 


THE END 





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